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BIOGRAPHICAL ANECDOTES OF PERSONS 

WHO HAVE 

ATTAINED TO EXTREME OLD AGE WITHIN THAT 
COLWTY. - 



BY, ,' 

WILLIAM GEAINGE, 

AUTHOR OP " BATTLES AND BATTLE FIELDS OF YORKSHIBE,' 

** CASTLES AND ABBEYS OP YORKSHIRE," " HISTORY OF 

NIDDERDALE," ETC., ETC. 



PATELEY BRIDGE: 

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THOMAS THORPE. 

LONDON: T, T. LEMARE, PATERNOSTER ROW. 

1864. 



SSI'S. 









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[Entered at Stationers,'* Hall.'\ 



INTEODUCTION. 



** The days of our years are threescore years and ten ; and 
if, by reason of strength, they be fourscore, yet is their 
strength labour and sorrow, for it is soon cut off, and we 
flyaway." Psalm, xc. 10. From this expression of the psal- 
mist we learn that the age of man has not been shortened 
for the last three thousand years, — as it was then, so is 
it now: age, and the many evils *' flesh is heir to," have 
done their work upon the human frame very often before 
it has reached the allotted round, and it has become as 
*^the clods of the valley." Numbers, however, do ex- 
ceed that period ; yet, generally, ** their strength is labour 
and sorrow." Old age was regarded by the Hebrews as 
a blessing from on high, or a reward attached to a life 
of virtue; it was, also, entitled to peculiar homage; and, 
no doubt, when men lived to the age of several hundred 
years, the wisdom they must have acquired would give 
them great influence in their family, or tribe. Many 
expressions of scripture confirm the opinion above given, 

B 



6 INTRODUCTION. 

as, "The fear of the Lord prolongeth days; but the 
years of the wicked shall be shortened." Proverbs x. 27. 
"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and 
the knowledge of the holy is understanding. For by me 
thy days shall be multiplied, and the years of thy life 
shall be increased. Poverbs, ix. 10, 11. " Thou shalt 
come to thy grave in a full old age, like as a shock of 
com Cometh in his season." Job, iv. 26. Numbers of 
texts might be cited, representing the wicked as "cut off 
in the midst of their days." 

The Egyptians, in the most glorious period of their 
history, paid grsat respect to old age. The young were 
obliged to rise for the old, and, on every occasion, to 
resign for them the most honourable seat. The Spartans, 
also, honoured the aged, — by saluting them, by giving 
them place in the streets, and in rising up to shew them 
honour in all companies and public assemblies : so that 
it was an agreeable thing to grow old in that city ; and 
old age had nowhere so honourable an abode as in Sparta. 

The Chinese erect statues, or honorary arches, to the 
memory of persons who have attained to the age of one 
hundred years, considering that such individuals must 
have been special favourites of heaven ; or, else, that 
they must have led such peculiarly virtuous and sober 



INTRODUCTION. 7 

lives as justly to intitle them to the respect and gratitude 
of society. 

What is the oldest age that is now attained ? What 
is the measure of the complete orbit of human life ? 
The census of 1851 furnishes some aid towards the pro- 
secution of this inquiry. In Great Britian, more than 
half a milHon of the inhabitants (five hundred and ninety- 
six thousand and thirty,) have passed the barrier of 
** threescore years and ten ;" more than one hundred and 
twenty-nine thousand have passed the Psalmist's limit of 
*' fourscore years," and nearly ten thousand have lived 
ninety years, or more ; a band of two thousand and 
thirty- eight aged pilgrims have been wandering ninety- 
five years and more on the unended journey; and three 
hundred and nineteen say that they have witnessed more 
than one hundred revolutions of the seasons. — Registrar 
GeneraVs Report. — Census 1851. 

Though longevity prevails more in some districts than 
in others, yet it is by no means confined to any particular 
nation or climate ; nor are there wanting instances of it 
in almost every quarter of the globe ; nor does it depend 
60 much, as has been supposed, on any particular 
climate, situation, or occupation in life : for we see that 
it often prevails where all these are extremely dissimilar; 

b2 



8 INTEODUCTION. 

one circumstance, common to all instances of longevity, 
is that of being born of healtby parents ; another, of almost 
as universal application, is of being inured to daily la- 
bour, temperance, and simplicity of diet : for it is rather 
among the inferior ranks of mankind, than amongst the 
sons of ease and luxury that we shall find most numerous 
instances of longevity ; not, unfrequently, amongst ap- 
parently the most unfavourable circumstances, as the 
old sexton of Peterborough, mentioned in Fuller s 
Worthies, who, notwithstanding his unpromising occu- 
pation among dead bodies, lived long enough to bury 
two crowned heads, and to survive two complete genera- 
tions. The subsistence of old Parr, and Henry Jenkins 
consisted of the coarsest fare, as they sometimes lived by 
begging. Many common soldiers, tinkers, mendicants, 
and the inmates of workhouses have lived to extreme 
old age. The plain diet, and invigorating employments 
of country life, are acknowledged to be highly conducive 
to health and longevity, while the luxury and refinements 
of large cities are allowed to be equally destructive to 
the human species. From country villages and not 
from crowded cities, the greatest number of instances 
of longevity are drawn. It appears, from the London 
bills of mortality, during a period of thirty years, — from 



INTRODUCTION. 



1728 to 1758,— the number of deaths was 750,322, 
and that, in all this number only 242 persons had 
survived the hundreth year of their age. — Fothergill 
on Longevity, 

Many instances are cited of men living in the ancient 
world more than a hundred years, — as, Hippocrates, 
physician of the island of Cos, aged 104 ; Democritus, 
the philosopher of Abdera, aged 109 ; Galen, physician 
of Pergamus, aged 140. In the earlier part of the 
christian era, Italy appears to have been highly favour- 
able to the prolongation of human life, since we learn, 
from the taxing of the people in the reign of the Em- 
peror Vespasian, Anno Domini 76, that there were 
found, in that part of Italy lying between the Appenine 
mountains and the river Po, one hundred and twenty- 
four persons who either equalled, or exceeded, one hun- 
dred years of age, namely, fifty-four of one hundred 
years each; fifty-seven of one hundred and ten; two of 
one hundred and twenty-five ; four of one hundred and 
thirty ; four of one hundred and thirty- six ; and three 
of one hundred and forty years each. At the same 
time, in Parma, were three of one hundred and twenty, 
and two of one hundred and thirty years each. In 
Placentia, one of one hundred and thirty- one years. In 



10 INTEODTJCTION. 

Faventia, one of one hundred and tliirt3^-two ; six of one 
hundred and ten ; and four of one hundred and twenty 
years each. In Rimino, one — Marcus Aponius — of one 
hundred and fifty years. Extraordinary instances of 
long life occur in all climates, — from the frozen steppes 
of Russia to the sultry and pestilential swamps of Car- 
racas ; from the Orcades to the equator. The negro, even 
in a state of slavery, in the southern states of America 
and the West Indian islands, has heen known to attain 
extreme old age, under what may be considered the 
most unfavom-able circumstances. A few instances may 
suffice to prove the position. In 1790, in the parish of 
EKzabeth, in the island of Jamaica, died a negro woman 
named Cooba, at the age of one hundred and ten years. 
She was a slave, the property of the Honourable Thomas 
Chambers. Her memory was perfect to the last, and 
she could see to thread a needle until within a few 
months of her death. She saw four generations of her 
master's family. Samuel Pinnock, also a negro, of 
Kingston in Jamaica, died in 1796, at the age of one 
hundi-ed and ten. Esmina Diamond, a negress pf the 
same town, died in 1812, aged one hundred and thirty. 
Ann Wignell, of Port Royal, in Jamaica, died in the 
game year, aged one hundred and forty- six. She was 



INTRODUCTION. 11 

born in Africa, torn from her friends and kindred, and 
carried as a slave into tlie West Indies. Sypliax Brown, 
a manumitted slave of Cumberland, United States, died 
in 1846, aged one hundred and fifteen. Mr. Lawson, 
in his travels through Carolina, in 1700, thus describes 
an old Indian woman whom he saw among the Tuscoro- 
ras : — '^We saw, at the Cassetta's cabin, the strangest 
spectacle of antiquity I ever knew, it being an old Indian 
squaw, that, had I been to have guess 'd at her age, bj 
her aspect, old Parr's head (the Welch Methusalem) 
was a face in swaddling clouts to hers. I made the strictest 
enquiry that was possible, and by what I could gather she 
was considerably above one hundred years old; not- 
withstanding, she smoked tobacco and eat her victuals 
to all appearance as heartily as one of eighteen." Cap- 
tain Cespedes, of the Caraccas, died in 1789, aged one 
hundred and ten. He belonged to the militia of Pardo, 
and was esteemed a prodigy of that climate, where 
human life is seldom protracted to the extent of even 
sixty years. Jean Cayetan, of Tesontla, New Spain, 
South America, died in 1788, aged one hundred and thirty. 
A Spanish writer, Bartholomew Leonarda de Argensola, 
in his history of the discovery and conquest of the 
Molucas and Philippina islands, says, when speaking of 



12 INTRODUCTION. 

the island of Banda, **Men live in this island longer 
than in any other part of the world. The Dutch saw 
several who exceeded one hundred and thirty years of 
age." In a list, published officially in Russia, of the 
number of deaths in 1811, there are five hundred and 
eighty-four instances of people who died in the various 
provinces of that vast empire at upwards of one hun- 
dred years old, viz.: — four hundred and sixty- seven 
above one hundred; one hundred and thirteen above 
one hundred and five ; three of one hundred and forty ; 
and one of one hundred and fifty years. The remote 
and lonely Shetlands are not without their instances of 
longevity. Buchanan, in his History of Scotland, thus 
speaks of them : ** The healthiness of these people ap- 
peared in one named Laurence, in our own time, who, after 
he was an hundred years old, married a wife, and when 
he was one hundred and forty used to fish with his skifi", 
even in a rough and tempestuous sea. He died only 
lately, not by the shock of any grievous disease, but 
merely by the infirmity and languishing of old age." 

Lord Bacon, in his History of Life and Death, quotes 
as a fact unquestioned, that a few years before he wrote, 
a morris dance was performed in Herefordshire, at the 



INTRODUCTION. 13 

May-games, by eight men, whose ages in the aggregate 
amounted to eight hundred years. 

The following elegantly written remarks on the dif- 
ferent periods of life are from the report of the Eegistrar 
General. — Censics, 1851. 

Every year of age from birth exhibits some appreciable 
change, and any subdivision is necessarily arbitrary 
to some extent ; but the century of life may be, for 
some purposes, conveniently subdivided, as it was by 
Wargentin in the first Swedish Census, into twenty 
periods of five years, — twenty lustres ; for others into 
ten decenniads ; and for others into five vicenniads, — 
each of four lustres, or of twenty years. We have used 
the latter division largely in the Report, and shall show 
that it is well characterized. 

The first age, covering the first twenty years of life, 
extends over childhood, boyhood, and youth. It is the 
age of growth ; and it is the age of learning, for the 
greater number, in the beginning, on the mother's 
arms ; in the middle of the period, at school ; in the 
end, at the workshop : where, in succession, the manners, 
language, knowledge, and skill, — the traditional and 
hereditary acquisitions of mankind, — are transmitted to 
the new generation. Generous sentiments, passions, 



14 INTEODUGTION. 

enthusiasm, display themselves at the end, and crimes 
are committed by evil natures. 

The second age, or vicenniad (20 — 40) of which 
thirty years is the central point, embraces the period of 
early manhood. Growth is completed ; weight, stature, 
and strength are at their maximum. It is the athletic, 
poetic, inventive, beautiful age, — the prime of life. 

It is the soldier's age. The apprentice becomes the 
journeyman; who attains, at the end, the highest 
mechanical skill, and earns the highest wages. Marriage 
is contracted, and the man hears the name of father 
from the lips of his children. In bad natures, and un- 
favourable circumstances, it is the age of crime, of 
passion, — of madness, which breaks out in its wildest 
forms, — as well as of wasting maladies. 

In the third vicenniad (40 — 60), of which the middle 
point is fifty years we see men in the higher professions 
first attain eminence, the capital which has been ex- 
pended in their education returns rapidly ; their estab- 
lished character gives them the confidence of their 
fellow-men; experience and practice enable them to deal 
as proficients with the great interests and questions of 
the world. They see their children enter life. The 
edifices, of which the foundations were laid before, spring 



INTRODUCTION. 15 

up around them. The prudent, tried, skilful, inventive . 
man now oftens becomes, in England, a master, and 
controls establishments in which he was once the clerk, 
the workman, the apprentice boy. It may be justly 
called the intellectual age, the legislative, the judicial 
age. The statesman speaks, and his voice reverberates 
over an attentive nation. But the passions and labours 
of life wear deep furrows ; the health of the workman 
is shaken in great cities, and he falls before their 
pestilences ; the heart and the brain are sometimes 
over- wrought; diseases acquire force, and the man easily 
falls their victim. 

The fourth vicenniad (60 — ^80), of which the year 
seventy is the centre, may be considered the laureate 
age of a complete life. The veteran retires from the 
camp, the workman from the workshop, the labourer 
from the field, where they have done their duty. The 
age of strength is over; but as civilization advances, 
men are not now cast aside, but enter upon the legitimate 
rewards and honours of their accumulated services. The 
merchant has acquired riches ; the manufacturer has 
given his name to a lasting house of business ; the pro- 
prietor's improvements are visible in his lands and 
houses ; the physician, the judge, the bishop, discharge 



16 INTEODUCTION. 

the highest function of their respective professions ; the 
fruits of the prescient statesman's wise measures ripened 
under opposition are now gathered in by a grateful 
people. Integrity and wisdom in counsel are sealed by 
experience, and receive the recognition which envy can 
no longer gainsay. The father, as well in humble as 
in high life, who has wisely ruled his house, receives 
the homage of his sons at the head of new families ; the 
devoted mother is called by her children blessed : and 
upon the sovereign who has trod the paths of duty, righ- 
teousness, and greatness, among a free people, undying 
glory rests. As a good life in old age becomes some- 
thing almost divine, so a bad life is then transformed 
into a "wrinkled eld" of almost supernatural malignity ; 
of which the designations evil eye, wizard, witch, the 
"old serpent, the devil," express the popular dread and 
abhorrence ; 

"And that which should accompany old age — 
As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends : " 

the tyrant and hoary plotter of evil 

"Must not look to have ; but in their stead, 
Curses, not loud, but deep.'* 

If the vitality rapidly decreases in the fourth age, the 
strength fails, the senses grow dull, the mind itself 



INTRODUCTION. 17 

decays, in the fifth vicenniad (80 — 100) : and then the 
colours of the world fade away : the forms of men are 
indistinctly seen in the dim twilight ; the voices of men 
are heard, but like inarticulate murmurs of the sea ; the 
sense of being, and the memories themselves of well 
spent years, are at last obliterated. The lamp of life is 
not broken, but is softly burnt out. 

While little more confidence should be placed in the 
relations of the ages of men extending to centuries than 
in the hopes of the alchymists who sought elixirs, this 
last period appears to be as much a necessary part of 
the perfect life, according to the Divine plan, as the age 
of childhood and youth. It is the period of repose, after 
the labours, struggles, achievements, and glories of 
manhood are over. The grand climactric age, — the 
year of abdication, — difiers in every individual — as the 
human structure varies infinitely ; but, by the nature 
of things, it should precede by many years the hour of 
dissolution ; for, if it is grateful to a nation to visit the 
places in which its great men have lived — to gaze on 
their monuments, and to follow their cars in pageants and 
processions to the tomb, — it is still more grateful to know 
that they are in the midst of us, and to view sometimes 



18 INTEODUCTION. 

the lineaments that are still more intimately associated 
with their immortality. 

It has been observed by some writers on longevity, 
that moderate sized and well proportioned persons, have 
the greatest probability of attaining to extreme old age. 

This view is fully borne out by facts ; yet this rule is 
not without exceptions, as Mary Jones, who died at 
Wem, in Shropshire, in 1773, at the age of one hundred 
years, was very deformed and lame, and only two feet, 
eight inches in height ; — while James Mac Donald, who 
died near Cork, in Ireland, August 20th, 1760, at the 
age of one hundred and seventeen, was seven feet six 
inches in height. 

Longevity is constitutional ; as no man can live to an 
advanced age who brings the seeds of disease into the 
world with him, and who has not, also, great vigour of 
heart, lungs, stomach, and muscles. The principal 
index of great longevity, is an ample development of the 
vital apparatus, or a capacious chest ; and, of course, 
large lungs, heart, stomach, and vital organs, with a 
proportionally smaller head. A spare, wrinkled, muscu- 
lar temperament, — which may be known by great 
distinctness of the muscles, bones, furrows, and 
projections ; prominence of nose, eye-brows, chin, dx., — 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

also foretokens tenacity of life. — Foster , on Hereditary 
Descent. 

Longevity is not unfrequently hereditary, as numerous 
instances can be given of long lived persons in one 
family. Besides those mentioned in the following pages, 
we give a few cases in point. Thomas Parr lived to be 
one hundred and fifty-two years old, and a son, one 
hundred and nine, a grandson, one hundred and forty- 
three, and Robert Parr, a great grandson, died September 
21st, 1757, aged one hundred and twenty-four. 

The ** Library of Health," for 1840, contains the 
following : — '* We were personally acquainted with the 
late Donald Mc Donald, of quarrelsome memory, who 
was sent to the House of Correction, for a street brawl, 
when about one hundred and five years old. When 
one hundred and six, he enjoyed excellent health. His 
father lived to be one hundred and thirty-seven, and no 
one knows when he would have died, had he not been acci- 
dentally killed. Mrs. Jane Simmons, died in London, 
in 1792, aged one hundred and nineteen years. She 
left two daughters, each one hundred years old. 

Why should not longevity be hereditary as well as 
consumption and premature death ? 

One fact is certain, and significant to those whom it 

c 2 



20 INTRODUCTION. 

concerns, no kings, nobles, poets, historians, philoso- 
phers, deep thinkers, or able writers, have ever rounded 
the century. Not many mariners, or sea-faring men at- 
tain to extreme old age, though instances sparingly occur. 
Lawyers appear to die before they become centenarians. 
No great military commander appears (at least in modern 
times) to have attained to remarkable old age, most of 
them dying young, while numbers of common soldiers 
have lived a century or more. The easily satisfied, un- 
ambitious, unthinking, cheerful, contented being whom 
no cares annoy, and no troubles reach, appears to be the 
choice and favourite individual for long life. M. Grellier 
says, ^'The cheerful and contented are certainly more 
likely to enjoy good health and long life, than persons 
of irritable and fretful dispositions ; therefore, whatever 
tends to promote good humour and innocent hilarity, 
must have a beneficial influence in this respect ; and 
persons whose attention is much engaged on serious 
subjects, should endeavour to preserve a relish for cheer- 
ful recreations." Of the great mass of centenarians it 
can only be said as of the man in the '^common lot," 

" Once, in the flight of ages past, 

There lived a man, and who was lie? 
Mortal ! however thy lot be cast, 
, That man resembled thee !" 



INTRODUCTION. 21 



" The annals of the human race, 
Their niins, since the world began, 

Of him afford no other trace, 

Than this, — ' There lived a man !' " 

Comparatively speaking, very few of them have per- 
formed actions worthy of record ; others perform great 
deeds in a short life ; they are distinguished for their 
length of life, and for that alone ; men think about them, 
talk about them, write about them, because they lived 
long, — not that they lived well. And what wonder, since 
life is a subject of great importance to all ; all kinds of 
means are employed to preserve it, and even to lengthen 
it ; in short, to live long appears to be the great aim and 
object of all. Some have even gone so far as to attempt 
a renewal of youth ; ancient fable relates that by the 
magical arts of Medea, Mson was changed from an old 
into a young man : the story is told in the seventh book 
of Ovid's Metamorphoses. 

" His feeble frame resumes a youthful air, 
A glossy brown his hoary beard and hair. 
The meagre paleness from his aspect fled, 
And in its room sprang up a florid red ; 
Through all his limbs a youthful vigour flies, 
His emptied art'ries swell with fresh supplies : 
Gazing spectators scarce believe their eyes. 
But iEson is the most surpised to And, 
A happy change in body and in mind ; 
In sense and constitution, the same man, 
As when his fortieth active year began." 



22 INTRODUCTION. 

In the year 1510, Ponce de Leon, a Spanish captain, 
having heard from the Indians of Cuba, of an island, 
where, they asserted, was a spring whose waters had the 
virtue of restoring youth to the aged, and vigour to the 
decrepit : Ponce thought this fountain would be an in- 
exhaustible source of revenue to him, as he could levy 
a tax upon all who derived benefit from its influence. 
He fitted out two ships and went in search of it through 
the group of islands called the Lucayos. Wherever he 
stopped, he drank of aU the running streams and stand- 
ing pools, whether their waters were fresh or stagnant, 
that he might not miss the famous spring. He enquired 
of all the natives he met, where he could find the won- 
drous Fountain of Youth. It is hardly necessary to say 
that he did not find it ; he, however, discovered the 
mainland of Florida, so that his voyage was not quite 
in vain. 

In the middle ages the alchymical philosophers sought 
to find *'The Elixir of Life," which was to renew youth, 
cure wounds and diseases of all kinds, and, in short, 
render man immortal. The old romances are full of 
stories of this kind, which are most unmercifully treated 
by Cervantes in Don Quixote, where he makes that re- 
doubted knight compound the ** balsam of Fierabras," 



INTRODUCTION. 23 

**And he that has it need not fear death, nor so much 
as think of dying by any wound. And therefore, when 
I shall have made it, and given it you, all you will have 
to do is, when you see me in some battle cleft asunder 
(as it frequently happens), to take up fair and softly 
that part of my body which shall fall to the ground, 
and, with the greatest nicety, before the blood is con- 
gealed, place it upon the other half that shall remain in 
the saddle, taking especial care to make them tally 
exactly. Then must you immediately give me to drink 
only two draughts of the balsam aforesaid, and then you 
will see me become sounder than any apple." 

In the ** Turkish Spy," Vol. I. pp. 266-7 is an 
amusing account of old age and the elixir of life : we give 
an extract. 

** To Bedredin, Superior of the Dervishes 

OF COGNI, in NaTOLIA." 

<« Thy great age does not astonish me, seeing thy 
father, who is yet alive, is 107 years old, and thou art 
not above 82, which makes me hope to see a great while 
yet both one and the other, draw down, by their prayers, 
and merit of their good actions, the blessing of Heaven 
on the glorious empire of the Ottoman Court, to whom 
all the empires and monarchies of the world ought to 



24 INTRODUCTION. 

submit." .... **The christians say, when God 
gave them the commandments, he promised long life to 
such only who perfectly honoured those, who, under 
God, brought them into the light. If this be true, as 
'tis very likely, 'tis not to be doubted, but that a long 
life is the recompence which God gives those who live 
well : and the Nazarenes, who are criticks, affirm, — 
That sin alone is the cause that men do not live so long 
as they did before the deluge, for then they remained 
such a while in life, as would tempt one to think they 
were to have been immortal. They say that after the 
deluge, God changed the nature of man; and instead of 
that great number of years, which made up the course 
of so long a life, they cannot live, at farthest, above 
120 years, and that there are few which arrive to 80, and 
whatever is beyond this is misery and torment, or a kind 
of senselessness, which makes men like beasts. 

'* I know few people but what are agreed, one may 
cure or mitigate the inconveniences which happen to us ; 
but few are of opinion that life can be lengthened ; yet, 
if this is possible, we may then believe a story, which is 
believed here, and which happened the past year in Paris. 

"An ancient man went to a Dervise of this great town, 
and thus accosted him : * I am come. Reverend Father, 



INTRODUCTION. 25 

to know of you, whether I may, in good conscience, de- 
termine to live no longer, being quite weary of living. 
I have, already, arrived to the 129th year of my age, by 
means of a liquor, which chemistry has taught me, 
whereby I did scarce perceive, from anything I felt, that 
I was going down ; yet, however, this long life appears 
at present, to me irksome and intolerable. My blood 
is so purified in my veins, that I have remained vdthout 
any of those passions whereunto mankind are so gene- 
rally subject. My taste serves me no longer to discover 
the delicacy of meats. My ears, although they be not 
deaf, yet will not let me distinguish true harmony, from 
what is only a confusion of sounds. Mine eyes are 
open to see, but are not cheered with any object. My 
faculty of smelling is struck with scents, yet they 
make no impression on it. I touch, but I feel not what I 
touch ; and I touch all things indifierently. Mine heart 
is no longer sensible, nor affected with tenderness and 
passion, for my friends. Bile, in me, has no longer its 
usual heat. Joy and sorrow, anger, desire of having, 
hope and hatred, are extinguished in me ; whereby I am 
become insensible in conserving, if I may so say, all my 
senses. I am resolved, therefore, to let myself die, 
provided you can assure me I may do it without sin ; for, 



26 INTRODUCTION. 

should I remain two days without taking this precious ! 
elixir, I am certain I should soon expire, and so be delivered 
from thevexation that overwhelms me.' 'Tis said that the 
dervise answered this philosopher, — * That he might not 
desire death ; but, on the contrary, preserve his life ; 
and, supposing he made use of no secret of magick to 
prolong his days, he should believe that the marvellous 
potion, of which he had found the secret by his stady 
and travel, was a present from heaven : that 'tis true he 
would be rid of a troublesome life, but he could not pro- 
cure the end of it without a crime ; and that he was 
obliged to preserve it, to suffer with greater submission 
the pains he complained of, which could not be com- 
parable to the pleasures he had received, by enjoying 
the gift which God had bestowed on him.' 

'' Paris, 15th of the 1st Moon 
of the year 1641." 

As gold always bore the highest value amongst the 
metals, the alchymists, from a ridiculous analogy, con- 
cluded that it must surpass all other things in the 
preservation of health, and the cure of diseases ; and 
all their efforts were directed to the art of dissolving it, 
so as to render it potable, and to prevent it from again 
being converted into metal. The common people, in 



INTRODUCTION. 27 

some countries, particularly Italy, Germany, and France, 
oftentimes denied themselves the common necessaries of 
life, to save as much as would purchase a few drops of 
the tincture of gold, which was offered for sale by some 
superstitious, or fraudulent, chemist : and so thoroughly 
persuaded were they of the efficacy of this remedy, that 
it afforded them, in every instance, the most confident,, 
and only hope of recovery. These beneficial effects were^ 
positively promised ; but were looked for in vain. All 
subduing death would not submit to be bribed with gold, 
and disease refused to hold any intercourse with that 
powerful deity, who presides over the industry and com- 
merce of all nations. — Thaumaturgia : or, Elucidations 
of the Marvellous, p. 116. 

The successors of these emperics still continue to live 
on the love of life, so strongly implanted in the heart of 
man, as is evident from the number of nostrums daily 
thrust before the public, in the shape of Life Pills, and 
all that genus of bold impositions. 

The number of centenarians existing at one time in 
the world is very small, compared with the mass of the 
population, — not averaging more than thirteen or four- 
teen in a million, or one in every seven hundred thou- 
sand inhabitants ; varying much, however, according as 



28 INTBODUCTION. |^j 

the locality is favourable to health, or otherwise ; a fact 
of which our own county affords sufficient evidence. At I 
the census of 1851, the population of all Yorkshire was 
returned at one million seven hundred and eighty-nine 
thousand and forty- seven : of whom twelve only were 
said to be one hundred years of age ; and these were 
distributed in the following unequal manner, relative to 
the population amongst whom they dwelt, — 
West Riding, population, 1,840,051, centenarians, 2, 
East do. do. 254,352, do. 4. 

North do. do. 194,644, do. 6. 

These figures, more strongly than any language, point 
out the localities most favourable to longevity, shewing 
that the beautiful valleys and breezy downs of the north 
are far more favourable to health and long life, than the 
close, smoky, manufacturing towns of the west. Of 
these twelve aged people, five were males, and seven 
females : of the males, one had never been married, and 
the others were widowers ; the seven females were all 
widows : of seven of the twelve no occupation is speci- 
fied ; of the others, two were paupers, one a farm ser- 
vant, one a farmer, and one dependent on relatives : 
none of them are returned as of independent means, or 
belonging to the upper ranks of life. At the same time 



INTRODUCTION. 29 

the west-riding had its proportion of persons aged ninety- 
five, and upwards, as below — 
West Riding, males, 14, females, 29,=43'j 
East do. do. 3, do. 7,=lol Total 75. 
North do. do. 7, do. 15,=22J 
Of ninety years and upwards, the numbers were 
respectively — 

West Riding, males, 88, females, 142^230^ 
East do. do. 31, do. 52= 83 [ Total 438. 
North do. do. 43, do. 82=125. 
These numbers prove that there existed at that time in 
Yorkshire five hundred and twenty-five persons more 
than ninety years of age. 

At the same time in all England and Wales there were two 
hundred and fifteen, aged one hundred years and upwards, 
of whom seventy-eight were males, and one hundred 
and thirty-seven females (population, 20,959,477) ; 
twenty- seven of these were located in London, which 
appears a very great number to exist amidst the noxious 
effluvia and dense fogs of that overgrown metropolis; 
while, singular to relate, the rural part of Middlesex, the 
counties of Herts, Bucks, Oxon, Northampton, Bedford, 
and Cambridge, with their fine, mild climate, and agrestic 
population, had only six Centenarians ; while Durham, 



30 INTRODUCTION. 

bleak and moist, employing a great mass of its popula- 
tion in coal mines, had nine, Northumberland fourteen, 
Cumberland three, while the valleys, and mountains of 
Westmoreland, did not }deld one single individual of 
the age of one hundred. Scotland at that time had 
one hundred and three persons aged a century or up- 
wards, of whom thirty two were males and seventy-one 
females. i 

Of the occupations of those aged pilgrims on life's ; 
weary road it is necessary to say a few words, as, it is 
probable that their longevity is partly owing to their calling 
or employment. Of the one hundred and thirty- seven 
females in England and Wales exceeding one hundred 
years, fourteen are annuitants, a class of persons pro- 
verbial for long life, sixty-nine are widows, with no 
specified occupation ; eleven are paupers, twenty-four 
follow some business or calling ; and only one is said to 
be of independent means. Of the seventy- eight males 
oleven are agricultural labourers, seven farmers, six 
soldiers or pensioners, nine paupers, seven labourers, 
two annuitants, and two gentlemen; the others, with 
the exception of one, a lunatic, follow some manual 
calling, of whom three are shoemakers. From the above 
authentic facts it is quite evident that a life of ease and 



INTEODUCTION. 31 

plenty does not at all contribute to longevity. In every 
work we have seen, where length of life forms any part 
of the subject, rules for diet, and exercise are laid down 
by which those who follow them may attain to almost 
any age, whereas it is quite obvious that such rules can 
only be useful to the idle, and the rich, who can eat, 
drink, and amuse themselves at will, and who it is quite 
certain will not follow a life of temperance, and rough 
manual exercise for the sake of living to extreme old 
age. On the contrary, the poor, who are compelled by 
necessity to a life of hardship and toil, and generally 
of temperance too, enjoy good health, and live to a 
great age. 

The desire of longevity appears to be inherent in all 
animated nature, and particularly in the human race ; 
it is intimately cherished by us, through the whole du- 
ration of our existence, and is frequently supported and 
strengthened, not only by justifiable means, but also by 
various kinds of collusion. Living in an age when every 
branch of human knowledge is reduced to popular 
systems ; when the vigils of reason are hallowed at the 
shrine of experiment and observation ; though we be- 
hold in the immense variety of things, the utter useless- 



32 INTRODUCTION. 

ness of attempting to renovate a shattered constitution, 
or of improving a sound one to last beyond a certain 
period ; we nevertheless observe that in the inconceiv- 
able waste of elementary particles there prevails the 
strictest economy. Nothing is produced in vain, no- 
thing consumed without a cause. We clearly perceive 
that all nature is united by indissoluble ties, that every 
individual thing exists for the sake of another, and that 
no one can subsist without its concomitant. Hence we 
conclude, that man himself is not an insulated being, 
but a necessary link in the great chain which connects 
the universe. Nature is our safest guide, and she will 
be so with greater certainty, as we become better ac- 
quainted with her operations ; especially with respect to 
those particulars which more nearly concern our physical 
existence. Thus a source of many, and very extensive 
advantages will be opened; thus, we shall reach our 
original destination — namely, that of living long, and 
in the enjoyment of sound health, to which if purity of 
morals be added, the best hopes may be entertained of 
a happy state, in a future world, where its inhabitants 
never die. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 



Addy, Mrs., of Tinsley Toll-bar, near Eotherham, 
died in 1809, aged 101 years. She retained the com- 
plete use of her faculties to the last, though somewhat 
infirm in her limbs ; her sight continued so perfect that 
she was able to read a small print bible without spec- 
tacles. Her mother lived to the age of 103 years. 

Allason, William, Governor of Scarborough Spaw, 
died in 1775, at the age of 103, in possession of all his 
faculties. His attainment to extreme old age, without 
its usual attendant infirmities was the more singular as 
he was far from living temperately. His portrait is in 
possession of a friend in Scarborough, with this inscrip- 
tion — ** The picture of William Allason, Governor of the 
Spaw, taken in 1760, then 88 years of age." Whenever 
he was questioned respecting his regimen, he usually 
replied that he always lived well, and that the Spaw 
water was his sovereign remedy, 

D 



34 YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Allison, Maby, of Thorlby, in the parisli of Skipton, 
died in 1668, aged 108 years. She was able to work 
at her spinning-wheel, until within two years of her 
decease. 

Allanby, Widow, of Thoralby, died February 8th, 
1665, aged 111 years. 

Atkinson, Alice, of the City of York, died in 1794, 
aged 109. 

AiRTON, Mary, of Horsforth, near Leeds, died in 1809, 
aged 105. 

Ambler, Peter, of Shelf, near Halifax, died 3rd 
December, 1708, aged 108. 

Andrews, Ann, of Sheffield, died in 1818, aged 100. j 

Armstrong, Ann, of Aldbrough, near Kichmond, died 
in April, 1766, aged 107, to which age she had lived in 
a stat6 of celibacy. 

AiCTON, Mrs., of Potternewton, near Leeds, died in 
1805, aged 105. 

AsKHAM, Mrs., of the City of York, died in 1791, 
aged 101. 

Atkins, Mrs. Jane, died April 17th, 1761, aged 
100. She was buried in the church of Great Grivendale, 
near Pockiington, where a monumental inscription attests 
the fact of her uncommon age. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 35 

Atkinson, Alice, spinster, of Settle, died in 1808, 
aged 97. She was a member of the Society of Friends, 
and much distinguished among that body for her activity, 
intelligence, and generally exemplary conduct. 

AsKRiGG, a small town in Wensleydale, is noted for 
the beauty of its scenery, and the salubrity of its air, as 
well as the general longevity of its inhabitants, of which 
a remarkable instance occured in the twelve months be- 
tween August, 1858, and 1859; during which period 
died, — Anthony Story, aged 88 years and 3 months ; 
James Harker, 95 years and 5 months; Mrs. Jane 
Metcalfe, 99 years and 4 months ; and William 
Thompson, 89 years and 6 months, giving an average 
of nearly 93 years each, or a total of 371 years. 

Some seasons appear particularly fatal to long lived 
persons, the above case may be cited as an instance ; 
another, not less remarkable, happened in this coimls^ in 
September, 1859, when, on Sunday, September 10th, 
died at Arksey, near Doncaster, in her 99th year, 
Sarah, wife of James Lillyman, Esq. On Monday, the 
11th, in his 95th year, Mr. John Thackray, of Weardley, 
near Harewood, who had been for upwards" of 60 years 
a gardener at Harewood House. And, on the same day, 



d2 



36 YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 






at Eipon, aged 96, Elizabeth, widow of Edward Greaves, 
farmer, Clotherholme, near that City. 

AvisoN, Matthias, of Kirkby Misperton, near Malton, 
died in 1822, aged 111. 

Bartlemer, Margaret, of Kirkstall, near Leeds, died 
in 1766, aged upwards of 102. She retained her facul- 
ties to the last. 

Barnard, Thomas, of Leeds, died in 1698, aged 103. 

Barnard, Grace, of Leeds, died in 1804, aged 101. 

Bailey, Michael, of Sherburn, died in June, 1808, 
aged 107. He was the oiiginal of the celebrated paint- 
ing called **The Woodman." He was abstemious and 
regular in his habits, and worked as a day labourer un- 
til he was more than 100 years of age. 

Bambles, Mrs., of Whitby, died in 1812, aged 94 
years. She lived in the same house with two sisters, 
one older, the other younger *than herself, both of whom 



^^ ' As Yorkshire Longevity is our theme, we cannot omit the 
following remarkable instance: Died, in April, 1835, "Old 
Adam," a donkey, the property of Mr. Carr, of Keighley. It 
was in the Carr's family above eighty years, and was fourteen 
years old when they bought it ; so this venerable specimen of 
assinine longevity departed this life upwards of ninety-five years 
of age. 



YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 37 

were alive at the time of her decease. The eldest was 
an unmarried lady, who had great vivacity of spirits, 
and frequently distinguished herself from her sisters, 
both of whom were widows, by the epithet of the 
*^young maid." 

Bateman, Mrs., of Aldborough, near Hull, died in 
1802, aged 100. 

Bayne, John, of Limley, near Middlesmoor, died 
November, 1802, aged 98. 

Bean, John, of Middlethorpe, near York^ died in 
1700, aged 107. 

Beilby, Mary, of Malton, died in February, 1767, 
aged 107. 

Beachill, James, of Monk-Fryston, died in 1817, 
aged 103. 

BiNNS, Mrs., of Ripon, died in 17&6, aged 96. To 
the end of her life she could see to read small print 
without the aid of spectacles. 

BiRKHEAD, William, of Brook-house, near Cleckhea- 
ton, died in 1797, aged 100. 

Blake, Jane, of Leeds, died in 1763, aged 114. 

Bradbury, Mary, of Sheffield, died in 1739, aged 
105. 



38 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Brook, Roger, of Halifax, died October 11th. 1568, 
aged 133. 

Brignell, Thomas, of Whitby, died in 1796, aged 
96. He was for many years an eminent whitesmith 
and mechanician, and was well known in most of the 
ports of England, especially in those trading to the Bal- 
tic and Greenland seas, for the excellence of his screws 
and harpoons. Along with Mr. Wilson, another me- 
chanic of Whitby, he appears to have constructed the 
first locomotive carriage, but on what principle we have 
no information. The invention, however, came to noth- 
ing, probably it was too much in advance of the age in 
which it was produced. 

BuTTERFiELD, RoBERT, of Halifax, died in December, 
1781, aged 102, From very humble beginnings, by 40 
years industry as a wool-stapler, he acquired a fortune 
of £40,000, which he employed extensively in works 
of charity and beneficence. 

Bourn, Ralph, of West Tanfield, near Ripon, died 
in 1728, aged 113. An inscription on a stone in the 
south porch of the church perpetuates his memory. 

BuLKELEY, — . On the 2nd of July, 1744, is re- 
corded the birth of a son to Mr. Ai'thur Bulkeley. The 
child's baptism is remarkable from these circumstances, 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 39 

— the infant's godfathers by proxy, were Edward Downs, 
Esq., of Worth, in Cheshire, his great great great great 
uncle; Dr. Ashton, master of Jesus' College, Cambridge, 
and his brother, Mr. Joseph Ashton, of Surrey street, 
in the Strand, his great great great uncles. The god- 
mothers by their proxies, were Mrs. Elizabeth Wood, 
of Barnsley, Yorkshire, his great great great great aunt ; 
Mrs. Jane Wainwright, of Middlewood Hall, Yorkshire, 
his great great grandmother, and Mrs. Dorothy Green, 
of the same place, his great gTandmother. It was observed 
of Mrs. Wainwright, who was then 89 years of age, that 
she could properly say, — Else daughter, go to thy daughter, 
for thy daughter s daughter has a son! 

o 

Catton, Mrs. Ann, of Hungate, York, died in 1814, 
aged 102. She was a poor, but very industrious woman, 
and possessed to the last a remarkably retentive memory, 
with so much bodily health and strength, as to be able 
to walk about by herself till within a week of her 
decease. 

Carnall, Ann, of Sheffield, died in 1817, aged 100. 

Cateby, Valentine, of Preston, near Hull, died in 
1782, aged 116. He went to sea in his eighteenth year, 
and continued a sailor thirty-six years ; he then commenced 



40 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

farming, which occupation he followed for thirty-six years 
more, when he retired from business. His diet, for the 
last twenty years of his life, was strictly confined to milk 
and biscuit. His mental faculties were quite composed, 
and perfect up to the close of his long life. 

Catterson. Mrs., of Silsden Moor, near Skipton, in 
Craven, relict of Sylvester Catterson, of Addingham, 
died in April, 1858, aged 102. In her youth she was 
a leader of fashion in her neighbourhood. She retained 
the use of her faculties to the last. 

Carter, Matthew, of Thornbrough, near Thirsk, 
died in November, 1666, aged 112. He was married 
at the age of 54. His widow survived him 6 years; 
dying 64 years after her marriage. 

Chapel, Sarah, of Whitley, died in 1766, 
104. 

Childers, Henry, of Bramham, died in 1809, aged 
102. 

Cocker, Ann, of Meanwood, near Leeds, died in 
1820, aged 100. 

CouLSON, Ralph, of Grimstone, died in 1771, aged 
107. 

Cousen, Mary, of Wakefield, died in 1791, aged 
103. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 41 

Coulter, Mrs., of Hovingham, died in 1772, aged 
103. 

Cook, Robert, of Clifton, died April 28tli, 1776, aged 
107. 

Corner, Mrs. Ann, widow, of Aldbrough, died in 
1817, aged 105. 

CoNGREVE, William, of Sheffield, died in 1754, aged 
111. 

CoNSiTT, Francis, of Burythorpe, near Malton, died 
in 1796, at the age of 150. He was maintained by the 
parish above sixty years, and retained his senses to the 

last. 

" Drooping and burthen'd with a weight of years, 
What venerable ruin man appears ! 
How worthy pity, love, respect, and grief — 
He claims protection — he compels relief. " 

Crabbe. 

CowGiLL, John, of Ripley, died in 1825, aged 104. 

He was descended from a family noted for longevity, his 

father and grandfather both having attained to extreme 

old age. He was a field labourer, hale and robust to the 

last, enjoying excellent health, and scarcely had a day's 

illness during the whole of his long life; even at the last 

the wheels of life appeared to come to a stand gently, 

and he passed away without any violent shock, like one 

going to sleep when his work was done. His memory 



42 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

was perfect to the last, and he was possessed of a fund 
of anecdote, and loved to narrate the doings of his youth. 
His widow, who survived him, was upwards of 90 at the 
time of her decease. i 

Craven, Philip, of old Malton, a day labourer, died * 
in 1844, aged 104. 

Calvert, Michael, of Knaresbrough, died December 
3rd, 1862, in the 92nd year of his age. He was for 
many years a druggist in that town, and author of a 
^'History of Knaresbrough," and other works. 

ID 

Dawson, Mrs., widow, of Thwing, in the East Riding, 
died in 1809, aged 107. She manifested no important 
signs of declining faculties, until within one week of her 
decease. 

Dawson, Mrs., of Wakefield, died in 1798, aged 101. 

Darnbrough, William, for 40 years sexton at Hart- 
with Chapel, near Ripley, died October 17th, 1846, aged 
100.* He used to boast, that in his youth, the fairies 
were very numerous on the moors around Hartwith, 
but most of them had disappeared before he died, which 

* An upriglit headstone, near the middle of the burial ground 
attached to Hartwith Chapel, bears the following inscription : "In 
memory of William Dainbrough, who, for the last forty years of 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 4B 

was matter of great regret to him. He used to take great 
delight in describing their beautiful appearance, when 
dancing on the moors, on moonlight nights. 

*' Such airy beings awe the untutor'd swain." 

Demaine, John, a small farmer, at West End, in the 
parish of Fewston, near Otley, died in 1820, aged 110. 
In his youth he was a tall, active man, and a remarkably 
swift runner. The great amusement of his life was fol- 
lowing the hounds, which he pursued on foot, with his 
accustomed energy, till within the last five years of his 
life. He was never known to change his dress after 
those days of severe exercise, though frequently drenched 



his life, was the Sexton of this Chapel. He died October 3rd, 

1846, in the one hundredth year of his age. 

' Thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace ; thou shalt be buried 

in a good old age.' — Genesis, xx. 15. 

" The graves around, for many a year, 
Were dug by him who slumbers here, — 
Till, worn with age, he dropped his spade, 
And in this dust his bones were laid. 
As he now, mouldering, shares the doom 
Of those he buried in the tomb ; 
So shall he, too, with them arise, 
To share the judgment of the skies." 
An examination of the Pateley Bridge Church Kegisters re- 
vealed the fact that Dambrough was one hundred and two years 

of age. 

Another stone, in the same burial ground, commemorates 

Francis Kobinson, of Hartwith, who died October 28th, 1852, 

aged ninety-four. 



44 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

with rain ; nor did he ever experience a days confinement 
from illness during the whole of his long life. At the age i 
of ninety-seven, he could mow an acre of grass in one day — 
a task sufficient for mostyoung men. After he had attained 
his 100th year, he complained that he felt he was growing 
old, as could not leap the walls, hedges and ditches, as he 
used to do. After struggling against the growing infir- 
mities of age, which impeded his favourite, and long in- 
dulged amusement, at the age of 105, he entirely gave 
up the sport, and acknowledged that he had become an 
old man. He was quick of sight and hearing to the last. 

" When his weak hand grew palsied, and his eye, 
Dark with the mists of age, it was his time to die." 

Deane, Sarah, of Horsforth, near Leeds, died in 1809, 
aged 102. 

Deline, Peter, Esq., of Leeds, died in 1773, aged 
104. 

Dixon, Jane, widow, of Scrayingham, died in 1854, 
aged 103. She retained full command of all her facul- 
ties till within a few months of her decease ; her sight in 
particular, was so perfect, that she could see to read type 
of the ordinary size, without the aid of glasses, up to 
the last hour of her life. 



YOBKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 45 

DoBSON, Thomas, of Hatfield, died in 1766, aged 139. 
He was eminent as an agriculturist. At the time of his 
death he left a family of three sons and seven daughters, 
all married, and living in that neighbourhood, who, to- 
gether with their children and grandchildren, to the 
number of ninety-one, attended his funeral. 

DoDSWoRTH, Mary, of Kirkdale, died July 16th, 1797, 
in the 102nd year of her age. There is an inscription 
to her memory in the north aisle of the parish church, 
of this place. 

DoDswoRTH, Margaret, wife of Robert Dodsworth, 
Esq., of Barton, in the North Riding. She lived in three 
centuries, being born, in 1598, and dying in 1704, aged 
105. After the death of her first husband, she married 
Colonel Henry Chaytor, the loyal and gallant defender 
of Bolton Castle, in Wensleydale, for the king, against 
the forces of the Parliment, during the civil wars of the 
the 17th century. She made her will a few months 
before her death, stating that she was *' in health of body, 
and of sound, good, and perfect memory;" and signs by 
a mark of three strokes 1 1 1 . In the church at Barton, 
is a monument to the memory of herself, her first hus- 
band and son. 



4G YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Buncombe, Thomas, of Beverley, lime burner, died 
in 1814, aged 114. He had been married to five wives. 

Elstoff, Mr., of Ledstone, died in 1756, aged 114. 

EsH, Mrs., of Burton Agnes, died in 1763, aged 
100. She appeared to have a presentiment that her 
death was approaching, and spent the last few days of 
her life in great tranquility, preparing every thing ne- 
cessary for her funeral. 

*' Faint as the rainbow melts to common air 

In tints scarce visible, so fsdntly falls 

On tlie mind's eye some image of tbe future." 

Ellerton, Simeon, of Craike, near Easingwold, died 
in 1799, aged 104. This man, in his day, was a noted 
pedestrian, and, before theestablishment of regular j90sfs, 
was frequently employed in walking commissions from^ 
the northern counties to London, and other places, which 
he executed with singular fidelity and despatch. He 
lived in a neat stone cottage of his own erecting ; and, 
what is remarkable, he literally carried his house upon 
his head ; it being his constant practice to bring back 
with him from every journey he undertook, some suitable 



YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 47 

stone, or other material for his purpose; and which, not 
unfrequently, he carried 40 or 50 miles on his head. 

Ellis, Francis, mariner, of Whitby, died in 1771, 
aged 95 ; within a few days, also, died Mary, his wife, 
aged 93. 

Singular instances sometimes occur of a man and his 
wife dying almost at the same time, after having lived a 
long time together: we give one or two by way of 
variety. — Charles Cotterell, of Philadelphia, United 
States, died in 1761, aged 120, and within four hours of 
his decease, his wife also died, aged 115 ; they had lived 
together in peace and unity for 98 years. — William 
Hudson, and Dinah his wife, of Sand Hutton, near Thirsk, 
died March 5th, 1839, one in the morning the other in 
the evening, aged, respectively, 83 and 85 years. 

IF 

Fentham, William, of Eipon, farmer, died in 1799, 
aged 100. 

Fentiman, Mr., of Bolton Abbey, in Craven, died in 
1801, aged 101. Throughout his long life he had en- 
joyed an almost uninterrupted state of good health. 

Frith, Mary, of Marsden, in the parish of Almond- 
bury, died in 1784, aged 111. 



48 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Frith, John, of Sowerby, near Halifax, died in 1757, 
aged 107. He left seven sons and daughters living ; the 
eldest of whom was 87, and the youngest 69 years of 
age. 

Finney, William, of Ripon, died February 13th, 
1813, aged 103. An inscription, in the nave of Ripon 
Minster records this instance of longevity.* 

Foss, Widow, of Morley, died in 1721, aged 114. 

Foster, Elizabeth, of Stainbum, near Otley, died 
in 1830, aged 101. 

Frank, Mr., of Pontefract, died in 1782, aged 100. 

Furnish, William, for many years an innkeeper in 
the City of York, died in 1811, aged 100. 

G- 

Garbutt, Jane, widow, of Welbury, near Northaller- 
ton, died in 1856, aged 110. She had been twice mar- 
ried, both her husbands being sailors during the old 
war. For some years, during the latter part of her life, 
she was maintained by the parish ; she, however, had a 
cottage to herself, and the parish officers, with laudable 



* In Ripon Minster, and the burial ground attached thereto, 
are about 750 monumental inscriptions, of which only two record 
the death of persons who attained to the age of 100. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 49 

humanity, engaged a female to attend to her wants. Her 
frame had shrunk into a very small compass ; she was 
comparatively free from pain, retaining all her faculties, 
and enjoying a pipe of tobacco to the last. According to 
her own statement, she **had burned the fragrant weed " 
nearly one hundred years, which will go far to prove if 
it be a poison, it is a slow one indeed. She always sat 
upright on her chair, rarely resting against the back, 
and, only the Saturday before her death, walked steadily 
across the floor of her cottage. 

Garforth, Dennis, of Keighley, died in 1625, aged 
103. 

Garraud, Mrs., widow, of Oulton, near Leeds, died 
in 1805, aged 100. This venerable lady, with her hus- 
band and family, resided at Lisbon, at the period of the 
dreadful earthquake, which, in 1775, nearly depopulated 
that cit}^ ; in which frightful catastrophe they lost the 
greatest part of their property. She had full possession 
of all her faculties to the last, and, by an easy transition, 
she passed from life to death on the very day she had 
completed her 100th year. 

" Taught, half by reason, half by mere decay, 
To welcome death — and calmly pass away." 



50 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Glenton, Helen, of Tunstall, near Catterick, died 
in 1808, aged 107. 

Glenton, Dinah, of Richmond, died in 1811, aged 
104. 

Gibson, William, of Hutton Bushell, near Scar- 
borough, died in 1796, aged 102. 

Gomeesall, Mary, of Wakefield, died in March, 1763, 
aged 107. She was mother to fourteen children, grand- 
mother to thirty-three, great grandmother to eighty-four, 
great great grandmother to twenty-five — in all, one 
hundred and fifty- six descendants. This is a respect- 
able number, but nothing to what is said to have been 
the family of Dennis Coorobee, of Ballindangan, Ireland, 
who died in 1805, aged 117 : who, during his lifetime, 
had seven wives, forty-eight children, two hundred and 
thirty- six grandchildren, nine hundred and forty-four 
great grandchildren, and twenty-five great great grand- 
children, in all, one thousand two hundred and fifty- 
three. 

Grave, Mary, an inmate of Rothwell workhouse, near 
Leeds, died in 1797, aged 96. She could read, knit, and 
sew, without glasses, and retained the use of her facul- 
ties, little impaired, nearly to the end of her life. jl 

Gray, Mrs., widow, Sheffield, died in 1843, aged 109. ^ 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 51 

GrREEN, Ann, a pauper of the parish of Spro thorough, 
but a native of Kirk-heaton, died March Gth, 1791, 
aged 118. 

Gray, Ann, of Shipton, near Market Weighton, died 
in 1797, aged 100. She earned her own independent 
Hving, by hard work, till within a very few years of her 
decease. 

Golden, Mrs, widow, of Hilton, in Cleveland, died in 
1802, aged 112. She retained the complete command 
of all her faculties, up to the latest period of her life, and, 
even in extreme old age, she was possessed of uncommon 
dexterity in carding wool, of which she used to boast 
that she could card more in one day than any other 
woman could spin. 

GuNSTON, Sarah, of the parish of St. Giles, in the 
suburbs of the City of York, died in 1792, aged 103. 
She had been a widow, at the time of her decease, 
more than half a century. 

GuNBY, Mrs. Caroline, died at Double Bridges, 
near Thorne, July 20th, 1829, in the 103rd year of her 
age. 

h: 

Hall, Mary, sextoness, of Bishophill, in the City of 
York, died in 1759, aged 105. She walked about, and 

E 2 



52 YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

retained her senses, until within three clays of her 
death. 

Harpeb, John, of Askwith, near Otley, died in 1700, 
•aged 100. 

Harrison, Mrs., widow, of Bacup, died in 1819, 
aged 108. 

Harrison, Catherine, of Thirsk, died March 8th, | 
1795, aged 100. 

Harrison, Elizabeth, buried at Kirkby Moorside, 
in 1719, aged 100. 

Harwick, William, of Leeds, died in May, 1772, 
aged 110. 

Halmshaw, Mary, of Wakefield, died in 1791, aged 
102. She had been a widow more than fifty years. 
Such was her general good state of health, combined 
with great activity, that, when in her seventy- seventh 
year, she walked from Wakefield to London, a distance 
of 180 miles, and returned,^ as she went, on foot. She 
retained all her faculties almost unimpared to the last. 

Hartop, Jonathan, of the village of Aldborougb, 
near Boroughbridge, died in 1791, aged 138. His pa- 
rents both perished by the plague, in their house in the 
Minories, and he perfectly well remembered the great 
fire of London, in 1666. He was short in stature, had 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. ' 53 

been married five times, and left seven childien, twenty - 
six grandchildren, seventy-four great grandchildren, and 
one hundred and forty great great grandchildren. He 
could see to the last to read without spectacles, and play 
at cribbage, of which game he was passionately fond, 
keeping his own account, with the most perfect recollec- 
tion of numbers. On Christmas day, 1789, he walked 
nine miles to dine with one of his great grandchildren. 
He remembered the person of Charles II. ; and once 
travelled from London, to York, with the facetious 
Killigrew. He was always sparing in his diet, and his 
his only beverage was milk. His disposition was cheer- 
ful, and, under every circumstance, how^ever adverse, he 
seemed to enjoy an uninterupted flow of good spirits. 
The third wife of this extraordinary man was stated to 
be an illegitimate daughter of the Lord Protecter Crom- 
well, who gave her a marriage portion of about £500. 
He possessed a fine portrait of Cromwell, by Cooper, for 
which Mr. Holies oJffered him £300, which was refused. 
Mr. Hartop, was personally intimate with the poet Milton, 
and, shortly after the restoration, lent him £50, which 
the bard returned him, though not without difficulty, as 
his circumstances then were at a very low ebb. Mr. 
Hartop would have declined receiving back the loan, 



54 . YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

but the independent spirit of the poet would not allow 
him to accept the offer, and he sent the money accom- 
panied with a somewhat indignant letter at the proposal, 
which document was found among the papers of the 
venerable patriarch after hi& decease. 

Halton, Alice, of Thirsk, died in 1814, aged 105. 
She was mother of twelve children, and lived to see the 
fifth generation of her descendants. 

Hanson, Hannah, of Castle Bolton, in Wensleydale,. 
died January 14th, 1812, aged 105. A stone, in Redmire 
chapel yard, commemorates this instance of longevity. 

Hatfield, Ann, of Tinsley, near Sheffield, died in 
1770, aged 105. 

Hayton, Betty, now living (1864^) with her third 
husband, in hospital yard Walmgate, York, in her 107th 
year. She has a daughter living with her aged 80 years. 

Hirst, William, a farm labourer, of Micklefield, near 
Aberford, died in 1853, aged 107. He was born mthin 
a few miles of Micklefield^ where he resided for eighty 
years. He followed his employment, as a farm labourer, 
regularly, until he was about ninety years old, and assis- 
ted at harvest work at the age of one hundred. His 
sight was so strong that he could see to read a news- 
paper without the aid of glasses, to the end of his days; 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 55 

his memory, also, continued unimpared, until within a few 
weeks of his death. The allowance he received from the 
parish — 3s. to 4s. a week, — he expended, principally, 
in the purchase of rum, a spirit of which he had always 
been extremely fond ; and which he considered as the 
balm of his life. His last illness confined him to the 
house nineteen weeks. He was married, and a family 
of two sons survived him. 

Hodgson, Elizabeth, of Scampston, near Pickering, 
died November 13th, 1760, aged 110. 

Horner, Jane, of Leeds, died in 1700, aged 109. 

HoYLE, Elias, of Sowerby, near Halifax, died in 
1805, aged 113. 
* Houseman, John, a labouring man of Sessay, near 
' Thirsk, died in 1777, aged 111. 

HoTHAM, Mrs., widow, of Tadcaster, died in 1811, 
aged 99. 

Holiday, John, of Milshay, near Leeds, died in 1812, 
aged 100. More than a hundred of his descendents, 
attended his funeral. 

HopwooD, Ann, widow, of Hull, died in 1814, aged 
\ 105. 

Hume, Thomas, gentleman, of the City of York, died 
in April, 1780, aged 115. 



56 YORKSHIBE LONGEVITY. 

Hughes, William, of Tadcaster, died in September^ 
1769, aged 127. 

Hunt, Willl^m, of Sheffield, died in 1708, aged 102. 

Humphries, Mrs., widow, of Elmsall, near Sheffield, 
died in 1809, aged 103. 

Holmes, Hannah, of Shipley, died in April, 1828^ 
aged 104 years. 

Hunter, Mrs., of Scarborough, died in April, 1786, 
in the 106th year of her age. She retained her facul- 
ties to the last. An hour before she expired, she gave 
instructions that her maiden name (Noel,) might be put 
upon her tombstone, — she being a descendant of thai 
family, third cousin to the Earl of Rutland, and, also, 
third cousin to the Earl of Gainsborough. 

'* How loved, how honoured once, avails thee not. 

To whom related, or, by whom begot ; 

A heap of dust alone remains of thee, 

'Tis all thou art ; and all the proud shaD be." 



" The man of whom I speak is old — so old, 
He seems to have outlived a world's decay ; 
The hoary mountains, and the wrinkled ocean, 
Seem younger still than he; his hair and beard 
Are whiter than the tempest sifted snow\" 

The oldest Yorkshireman of whom we have any re- 
cord, is Henry Jenkins ; some say the oldest English- 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 57 

man ; -t- others, the oldest man in the world since the 
days of the Hebrew patriarchs. He was born at EUer- 
ton-upon- Swale, a small village in the North Riding of 
this County, one mile from Catterick, and six from 
Richmond, in the year 1500, and the Parish Register, 
of Bolton-on- Swale, records his death, December 9th, 
1670 ; thus showing that he had completed his 169th 
year. The proofs on which the great age of Jenkins 
rest have been examined and sifted with the greatest 
severity and care;jjn order, if possible, to detect the 
slightest fallacy : but the fact appears to be established 
beyond the reach of reasonable doabt. Belonging to 
an humble station in society, but few events of his life 
are recorded, beyond his extraordinary longevity. His 



* Examples of longevity, even exceeding that of Jenkins, have 
been given ; the most remarkable, in England, is that of Thomas 
Cam, who is said to have died in Shoreditch, London, January 

J 28th, 1588, aged 207 years ; that he was born in the reign of 
Richard II., A. D., 1381, and lived in the reigns of twelve kings 

I and Queens of England. The proofs of his age are not given, 
and it is generally looked upon as apocryphal, 

I "The Petersburg Journal," published in 1812, an account of a 

' man, in the diocese of Ekaterinoslaw, who attained to an age be- 

; tween 200, and 205. 

j Peter Czartan, a native of Transylvania, died at Rofrosh, near 
Temswar, January 5th, 1724, aged 185. 

A mulatto man, name unknown, is said to have died at Fred- 
erick Town, in North America, in the year 1797, at the age of 180. 
A negress, named Louisa Truxo, was living in June, 1780, at 
Cordova, in the Tecuman, South Ainerica, then 175 years old. 



58 YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

youth was passed in the laborious employments of agri- 
culture ; afterwards, he became butler to the Lord Conyers, 
of Hornby Castle ; in his old age, he used to earn a 
livelihood by thatching houses, and fishing in the rivers. 
The earliest, and most reliable account of Jenkins, is 
given by Mrs. Anne Savile, daughter of John Savile, Esq., 
of Methley, ancestor of the Earls of Mexborough, a lady 
whose testimony may be considered as above suspicion, 
in a letter to Dr. Tancred Eobinson, F.R.S.j-i^ published 
in the transactions of the Eoyal Society : — This lady 
says, ** When I first came to live at Bolton, it was told 
me that there lived in that parish, a man near one hun- 
dred and fifty years old ; that he had sworn as a witness 
in a cause at York, to one hundred and twenty years, 
which the judge reproving him for, he said, he was butler 
at that time to Lord Conyers ; and they told me it was 
reported his name was found in some old register of the 
Lord Conyers, menial servants. Being one day in my 
sister's kitchen, Henry Jenkins coming in to beg an 
alms, I had a mind to examine him ; I told him he was an 



* Dr. Tancred Eobinson was second son of Thomas Robinson, 
Esq., and own brother to Sir William Robinson, Baronet, of 
Newby-on- Swale. He was M.D., and F.R.S., and was Knighted 
on his appointment as Physician to King George I. 



YORKSHIRE longe\t:ty. 59 

old man, who must soon expect to give an account to 
God of all he did or said ; and I desired him to tell me, 
very truly, how old he was ; on which he paused a little, 
and then said, to the best of his remembrance he was 
about one hundred and sixty- two, or, one hundred and 
sixty-three. I asked him what kings he remembered ? 
He said, Henry VIII. I asked him, what public thing 
he could longest remember ? He said, Flodden Field. 
I asked him whether the King was there ? He said, 
no ; he was in France, and the Earl of Surrey wa8< 
General. I asked him how old he might be then ? He 
said between ten and twelve; * for,' says he, ^Iwas^ 
sent to Northallerton with a horse-load of arrows ; but 
they sent a bigger boy from thence to the army witk 
them.' I thought by these marks, I might find some- 
thing in histories ; and looking into an old chronicle, I 
found that Flodden Field, was about one hundred and 
fifty-two years before, so that if he was ten or eleven 
years old, he must be one hundred and sixty- two, or one 
hundred and sixty-three, as he said, when I examined 
him. I found that bows and arrows were then used, and 
that the Earl he named was then General, and that King 
Henry VIII. was then at Tournay : so that I don't 
know what to answer to the consistencies of these things^ 



60 YORKSHIEE LONGEVITY. 

for Henry Jenkins was a poor man, and could neither 
write nor read. There were, also, fom- or five in the 
same parish, that were reputed, all of them, to be one 
hundred years old, or within two or three years of it, 
and they all said he was an elderly man ever since they 
knew him, for he was born in another parish, and before 
any Register was in Chui'ches,-^ as it is said. He told 
me then, too, that he was butler to the Lord Conyers, 
and remembered the Abbot of Fountains' Abbey very 
well, who used to drink a glass with his lord heartily ; 
and that the dissolution of the Monasteries he well re- 
membered. i 

Ann Savile." f 

The following remarks are' from the pen of Dr. : 
Tancred Robinson, Physician to King George I. : — ^ 

''This Henry Jenkins, died December 8th, 1670, at 
EUerton-on-Swale. The battle of Flodden Field was ] 
fought on the 19th of September, 1513. Henry Jenkins \ 
was twelve years old when Flodden Field was fought ; 
so that he lived one hundred and sixty-nine years. Old 
Parr lived one hundred and fifty-two years and nine I 
months ; so that Henry Jenkins outlived him, by com- i| 

* Parish Registers were first ordered to be kept in 1538. 9 



YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 61 

putation, sixteen years, and was the oldest man born on 
the ruins of the postdiluvian world. ^ 

This Henry Jenkins, in the last century of his life, 
was a fisherman, and used to wade in the streams. His 
diet was coarse and sour ; but, towards the latter end of 
his da^^s, he begged up and down. He was sworn in 
Chancery, and other courts, to above one hundred and 
forty years' memory, and was often at the Assizes at 
York, whither he generally went afoot ; and, I have 
heard some of the country gentlemen affirm that he 
frequently swam in the rivers after he was past the age 
of one hundred years." 

Miss Savile having sent a copy of her statement re- 
specting Jenkins, to Sir Eichard Graham, of Norton 
Conyers, near Eipon ; which was inserted in the house- 



* This high sounding, and not very definite, expression of the 
learned Doctor's, requires some modification, though the accuracy 
of the instances of old age given above, exceeding that of Jenkins 
may be impugned, though not easily proved false ; yet the ages 
of some of the patriarchs born after the flood, and. consequently 
" on the ruins of the j^ostdiluvian world," exceeded that of Jen- 
kins, as — Ai'phaxad, son of Shem, born two years after the flood, 
lived 438 years ; Salah, 433 ; Eber, 464 ; Peleg, 239 ; Eeu, 239 ; 
Serug, 230. — Genesis, xi. Abraham lived 175 years; "And the 
days of Isaac, were an hundred and fourscore years. — Genesis, 
xxxv. 28. 

Grainger, in his Biographical History, says — "He was the 
oldest man, of the postdilmians, of whom we have any credible 
' account.^'' 



i 



62 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

hold book of that family ; a transcript of it was, after- 
wards, given to Koger Gale, the celebrated antiquary, by 
Sir Reginald Graham, accompanied with the following 
note from himself: — 

^ ' Sir, — I have sent you an account of Henry Jenkins 
as I find it in my grandfather's Household Book, — the 
time of his death is mentioned, under the letter as I have 
set it down ; it seems not to have been the same hand : 
he must have lived sometime after Mrs. Savile, sent this 
account to Sir Richard. I have heard Sir Richard was 
Sheriff, when Jenkins gave evidence to six score years, 
in a cause between Mr. How and Mrs. Wastell, of 
EUerton. The Judge asked him, how he got his living ? 
he said '* by thatching houses, and fishing." This letter 
is without date, but appears to have been written, by 
Mrs. Savile, in the year 1661, or 1662, by what she says 
of the time when she examined the old man, compared 
with that of Flodden Field,* and was eight or nine years 
before he died, for I found his burial in the Register of 
Bolton Church, thus — '^ December the 9th, 1670, Henry 
Jenkins, a very old poor man." And was also shewed 

his grave. 

R. Graham." 
'' Norton, 26th August, 1739-40." 



j 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 63 

From his extraordinary age, he was often summoned 
as a witness, to give evidence on ancient rights and 
. usages, where his evidence was frequently of the most 
material importance. 

** A Commission out of the Court of Exchequer, dated 
12 Feby. 19. Charles II. authorizing George Wright, 
Joseph Chapman, John Burnett, and Richard Fawcett, 
1 Gents., to examine witnesses, as well on the part of the 
plaintiflf, as defendant, in a tythe cause between Charles 
Anthony, vicar of Catterick, complainant, and Calvert 
Smithson, owner and occupier of lands, in Kipling, in 
the parish of Catterick : 

Depositions taken in the house of John Stairman, at 
Catterick, Co. Ebor : on the 15th April, 1667 : — 

Henry Jenkins, of EUerton-upon- Swale, labourer, 
aged one hundred and fifty-seven, or thereabouts, swore 
and examined, says — ' That he has known the parties 
seven years, and that the tithes of lambs, calves, wool, 
colts, chickens, goslings, pigs, apples, pears, plums, 
flax, hemp, fruit, and multure of mills were paid in 
kind, by one Mr. Calvert,-^ the owner of the Lordship 
or Manor of Kipling, to one Mr. Thriscroft,t above 



* George Calvert, Esq., afterwards created Baron Baltimore. 
+ Henry Tliriscroft was Vicar of Catterick from 1594 till 
1603 ; Eichard Fawcett, from 1603 till 1660. 



64 YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

threescore years since, the Vicar of Catterick ; and were 
so paid in kind during the time of his the said Mr. 
Thriscroft's continuance ; and, after, the tithes of Kip- [ 
ling were paid in kind to one Richard Fawcett, deceased, \ 
for many years together as vicar of Catterick; and that ^ 
this deponent never knew of any customary tithes, paid 
by any of the owners, or occupiers, of the Lordship or 
manor of Kipling, or any other of the towns or hamlets 
within the said parish of Catterick ; but all such particu- 
lars named in the interrogatories were ever paid in kind 
to the vicar there for the time being."^ 

At the Assizes at York, in 1655, Jenkins appeared as 
a witness, to prove a right of way over a man's ground; I 
he swore to 120 years memory; for that time he remem- 
bered a way over the ground in question. Being cau- 1 
tioned, by the Judge, to beware what he said, as there ' 
were two men in the court, above eighty years of age 
each, who had sworn they remembered no such way, he 
replied that those men were boys to him. Upon 
which the Judge asked those men how old they took 
Jenkins to be ? They answered that they knew him 
very well, but not his age ; for he was a very old man 
when they were boys. 

* Clarkson's History of Richmond, p. 396. 



YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 65 

In the cause mentioned in Sir Keginald Graham's let- 
ter, between How and Wastell, of Ellerton, Jenkins again 
gave evidence to one hundred and twenty years memory. 
One of the Judges asked him what remarkable battle, or 
event, had happened in his memory, to which he answered, 
that, when the battle of Flodden Field was fought, where 
the Scots were beat with the loss of their King, he was 
turned of twelve years of age. Being asked how he lived, 
he said, by thatching and salmon fishing ; that when he 
was served with a subpoena, he was thatching a house, 
and he would diib a hook with any man in Yorkshire. 
He also stated that he had been butler to Lord Conyers, 
of Hornby Castle, and that Marmaduke Brodelay, lord 
abbot of Fountains, did frequently visit his lord, and 
drank a hearty glass with him — that his lord often sent 
him to enquire how the abbot did, who always sent for 
him to his lodgings, and, after ceremonies (as he called 
it) passed, ordered him, besides wassel, a quarter of a 
yard of roast beef for his dinner, (for that monasteries 
did deliver their guests meat by measure,) and a great 
black jack of strong drink. Being further asked if he 
remembered the dissolution of the religious houses, he 
said, very well ; and that he was between thirty and forty 
,^ years of age, when the order came to dissolve those in 



66 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Yorkshire ; and that great lamentation was made, and the 
country all in a tumult, when the monks were turned out. 

Another cause is also mentioned in which Jenkins ap- 
peared as a witness at York, in 1667, between the Yicar 
of Catterick, and "William and Peter Mawbank, in which 
he deposed, that tithes of wool, lambs, &c., were the 
Vicar's, and had been paid, to his knowledge one hun- 
dred and twenty years and more. | 

Of the family history and private life of the venerable '. 
old man, we have very little information ; he was mar- J 
ried, but what family he had we know not ; two sons 
have been mentioned as living a few years before their 
father's death, '^both of whom were much more infirm in 
memory and in body than the patriarch himself." If 
it were so, those sons had either not been born in the 
parish of Bolton, or never baptised, as there are only 
two of the name of Jenkins recorded in the parish re- 
gister, that of the old man himself, and his wife, who paid 
the debt of nature in 1668, two years before her vener- 
able partner, who, as already mentioned, died December ] 
9th, 1670. If the engraved portraits of him are to be 
depended on, he was a tall, spare man, with a coarse, 
strong, but not unpleasing countenance ; the beard is a 
principal feature, and appears to have descended down 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 67 

his breast with genuine patriarchial dignity ; his likeness 
is not unfrequently seen on public house signs, in this 
county. There is, however, said to have been a genuine 
portrait of him, taken by Kobert Walker, painter to the 
Lord Protector Cromwell, which was engraved in 1752, 
by Worlidge. 

^ In the year 1743, a monument was erected, by sub- 
scription, in Bolton church yard, to the memory of Jen- 
kins ; it consists of a square base of freestone, four feet 
four inches on each side, by four feet six inches in 
height, surmounted by a pyramid eleven feet high. On 
the east side is inscribed — 



I THIS MONUMENT WAS 

ERECTED BY CONTRIBUTION, 
IN Y^ YEAR 1743, TO Y^ MEMORY 

OF HENEY JENKINS. 

I On the west side — 

HENRY JENKINS, 
Aged 169. 

In the church, on a mural tablet of black marble, 
is inscribed the following epitaph, composed by Dr. 
Thomas Chapman, Master of Magdalen College, Cam- 
It bridge : — 

> f2 



68 YOEKSHIBE LONGEVITY. 

BLUSH NOT, MAKBLE, 

TO EESCUE FROM OBLIVION 

THE MEMORY OF 

HENRY JENKINS: 

A PERSON OBSCURE IN BIRTH, 

BUT OF A LIFE TRULY MEMORABLE; 

FOR 

HE WAS ENRICHED 

WITH THE GOODS OF NATURE, 

IF NOT OF FORTUNE, 

AND HAPPY 

IN THE DURATION, 

IF NOT VARIETY, 

OF HIS enjoyments: 

AND, 

THO' THE PARTIAL WORLD 

DESPISED AND DISREGARDED 

HIS LOW AND HUMBLE STATE, 

THE EQUAL EYE OF PROVIDENCE 

BEHELD, AND BLESSED IT 

WITH A patriarch's HEALTH AND LENGTH OF DAYS : 

TO TEACH MISTAKEN MAN, 

THESE BLESSINGS WERE ENTAILED ON TEMPERANCE, 

OR, A LIFE OF LABOUR, AND A MIND AT EASE. 

HE LIVED TO THE AMAZING AGE OP 

169; 

WAS INTEBEED HEEE, DEC. 6, {Uge 9,) 

1670, 

AND HAD THIS JUSTICE DONE TO HIS MEMORY 

1743. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 69 

This inscription is a proof that learned men, and masters 
of colleges, are not always exempt from the infirmity of 
writing nonsense. Passing over the modest request to 
the hlach marble not to blush, because it may feel itself 
degraded by bearing the name of the plebeian — Jenkins, 
when it ought only to have been appropriated to kings 
and nobles ; we find but questionable philosophy, in this 
inappropriate composition. 

The multitude of great events which took place during 
he lifetime of this man, are truly wonderful, and aston- 
ishing. He lived under the rule of nine sovereigns of 
England— Henry VH. ; Henry YIII. ; Edward YI. ; 

i' Mary ; Elizabeth ; James I. ; Charles I. ; Oliver Crom- 
well ; and Charles II. ; he was born when the Eoman 
Catholic religion, was established by law, he saw the 
dissolution of the monasteries, and the faith of the nation 
changed — Popery established a second time by Queen 
Mary — Protestantism, restored by Elizabeth — the civil 
wars, between Charles and the Parliament, begun and 
ended — monarchy abolished — the young republic of 
England, arbiter of the destinies of Europe, and the re- 
storation of monarchy under the libertine Charles II. 
During his time, England was invaded by the Scots ; a 

^ Scottish King was slain, and a Scottish Queen beheaded 



70 YOKKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

in England ; a King of Spain, and a King of Scotland, 
were Kings in England ; three Queens and one King, 
were beheaded in England in his days ; and fire and 
plague alike desolated London. His lifetime appears 
like that of a nation, more than an individual, so long 
extended and crowded with such great events. 

Jameson, Ann, of Aldbrough, near Eichmond, died 
in April, 1766, aged 102. She was confined to her bed 
during the last ten years of her life. 

Jackson, Maey, of Cropton, near Pickering, died in 
1790, aged 104. 

Jackson, Betty, of [Holbeck, near Leeds, died De- 
cember 22nd, 1828, aged 5IO6. Li her twenty-second 
year she accompanied the pack horses with rations to 
General Wade's army, then lying at Tadcaster, on its 
route northward to oppose the rebels in 1745. 

Jackson, Luke, of Gauxholme, died in 1802, aged 
103. 

Jarman, Betty, widow, an inmate of one of the alms- 
houses, York, died in 1811, aged 100. 

Johnson, Ann, of Aiskew, near Bedale, died in No- 
vember, 1777, in her 105th year. She was mother to 
six children, grandmother to thirty- six, and great grand- 
mother to six. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 71 

Johnson, Bartholemew, an eminent musician of 
Scarborougli, died in 1814, aged 105. In tlie year 1810, 
a minor Jubilee was celebrated in the town, in conse- 
quence of the aged worthy completing the first century of 
his existence. Lord Mulgrave honoured the meeting with 
his presence, and afterwards sent Mr. Jackson, the ar- 
tist, to take the portrait of the venerable old man, which 
his Lordship afterwards presented to the Corporation of 
Scarborough. 

" When age and virtue in one form are joioed, 
'Tis sweet to honour them. " 

Jones, Joan, of Guisborough, died in May, 1772, in 
the 103rd year of her age. 

Kj:ighley, Ann, widow, of Hunslet, near Leeds, died 
September 21st, 1796, aged 100. She was mother, 
grandmother, and great grandmother to 253 children, 
and was carried to the grave by twelve of her great 
grand children ; nearly one hundred of her descendants 
attended her funeral. 

KiRTON, George, Esq., of Oxnop Hall, near Reeth, 
died July 15th, 1764, in his 125th year. He was re- 
markable for his love of hunting ; after following the 
chase on horseback till he was upwards of eighty, so 



72 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

great was his desire for the diversion, that till he was 
100 years old, he regularly attended the ** breaking 
cover " in his single horse chair. He was a reniarkable 
instance that length of days are not always entailed on 
a life of temperance and sobriety, for no man — even till 
within a short time of his death — made more free with 
his bottle. '5^ His estate — which was considerable, and 
had been in the family for three centuries — descended 
to his son, Thomas Kirton, Esq., an eminent physician. 

KJERSHAw, Mary, widow, of Pontefract, died in 1788, 
aged 103. 

Kirk, John, died at Leeds, in 1850, aged 103.. 
He was a brickmaker by trade, and a native of Derby- 
shire. 

King, Mary, died in April, 1817, at Stonehaven, in 
Dent, aged 111. She was — ^for a number of years — 
one of the blind annuitants of Christ's Hospital. 



* Many men of intemperate habits have attained to extreme 
old age ; even some who have been habitual drinkers — the most 
remarkable of whom was, perhaps, Thomas Whittington, of Hel- 
lingdon, Middlesex, who died in 1804, aged 104. He retained 
the complete use of all his powers of mind to the very last hour 
of his Hf e. He was in the habit of drinking, daily, for many 
yeais, and till "within a fortnight of his death, from a pint, to a 
pint and a half of London Gin, which, singular to relate, seemed 
to have very little effect upon his system. On the other hand, 
more centenarians have been temperate in their habits, and some 
of them total abstainers from strong drinks. 



YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 73 

KiTCHiNGMAN, JoHN, EsQ., of Chapel AUerton,-'^ near 
Leeds, died in 1510, aged 115. 

KiTCHiNGMAN, RoBERT, EsQ., of the Same place and 
family, died May 7th, 1716, aged 100. He ordered his 
body to be buried by torchlight, at Chapel AUerton, 
where he was interred on the 16th of the same month, 
when one hundred torches were carried in the funeral 
procession. The room where the body was laid was 
hung with black, and a velvet .pall, with escutcheons, 
was borne by the chief gentry; the bearers had all 
scarfs, biscuits, and sack, and the whole company 
gloves. Fifty pounds was given amongst the poor in 
• the chapel yard, on the day of his interment. 

KiTCHiNGMAN, Mary, widow of the above, died July 



* Allerton Hall was, upwards of four centuries, tlie property 
and residence of tlie Kitchingman family. It was the largest and 
most ancient mansion in Chapeltown, consisting of about sixty 
rooms, with gardens and pleasure grounds. This family, for the 
long period of their residence here, were carried from the haU by 
torchhght, to be interred in the choir of St. Peter's church, in 
Leeds. At the funeral of any oi the family, the great chandeher, 
consisting of thirty-six branches, was Hghted. When Sir Thomas 
Fairfax took the town of Leeds by assault, in 1643, Henry Ro- 
binson, vicar of Leeds, and brother of Mary Kitchingm an, fled to 
this house, after having narrowly escaped with his Hfe, in cross- 
ing the Aire, below St. Peter's church. Tradition says that King 
Charles II. was concealed at this house before he went to Leeds. 
The Hall was sold, about the year 1755, to Josiah Gates, Esq., 
merchant, of Leeds. Part of the old Hall is yet standing, al- 
though the greatest part of it was taken down about the yeai* 1730, 



74 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

28th, 1716, aged 97. She was interred precisely in 
the same manner as her husband. 

Knowles, Isabella, died at Tenement, in the town- 
ship of Fountains' Earth, Nidderdale, January 30th, 
1846, at the age of 102. She resided at Pateley 
Bridge, until within a few years of her death, and so 
completely did she retain the use of her faculties, that 
she could see to thread a needle, and sew without spec- 
tacles, when upwards of one hundred years old. Her 
memory was perfect to the last. She was married and 
had a family. 

Xj 

Law, Matthew, of Sand Hutton, near Thirsk, died 
November 4th, 1814, aged 100. The Kegister of this 
Chapelry, between the years 1813, and 1844, contains 
the names of six persons buried there, each of them 
more than 90 years of age., 

Lambert, Phineas, of Thornhill, died in 1833, aged 
94. He was a member of the Calvinistic persuasion 
sixty years. He enjoyed good health to the last, and saw 
four generations of his descendants, to the number of 
152, most of whom followed him to the grave. 

Lawranoe, Robert, of Guisborough, died in March 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 75 

1762, aged 100. He had four wives, and was married 
to Jane Enderson, his last, when ninety years of age. 

Lazenby, Hannah, was living in the year 1823, at 
Well, near Bedale, aged 103. We have no information 
as to the time of her death. 

Lepton, Agnes, of Kepwick, near Thirsk, died May 
8rd, 1603, aged 103. 

' Lane, Esther, of Eggleston Abbey, died in 1804, 
aged 105. 

Legro, Daniel, of Leeds, died in 1773, aged 103. 

Levi, Lazarus, of Leeds, died in 1797, aged 105. 
He was of the Jewish persuasion, and, until he was up- 
wards of 100, he was in the habit of traversing the 
streets of Leeds, and adjacent townships as a vendor of 
fine hardware and trinkets. 

Lister, Sir Matthew, Knight, a native of Craven, 
died in 1657, aged 92. He was physician to Anne of 
Denmark, Queen of King James I., and one of the phy- 
sicians in ordinary to King Charles I., President of the 
College of Medicine in London, and one of the most 
• eminent of his profession in the Kingdom. 

Littleton, James, of Eishworth, near Halifax, died 
in 1700, aged 100. 

Lowther, Mr., of Guisborough, died in June, 1767, 
ased 100. 



76 YOKKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Logan, John, of Halifax, died in 1830, aged 104. 
He was 50 years a soldier, and after his discharge received 
a pension of fourteen shillings a week. He was twice 
married ; by his first wife, he had 8 girls ; and by his 
second, 12 girls and 12 boys. 

LovELL, Mrs., of Burlington, died in 1800, aged 100. 

LowTHER, Hannah, died at Thornton, near Pickering, 
September 10th, 1861, aged 104. She retained all her 
faculties to the last, and could read ordinary print, a 
short time before her death, without spectacles. 

Lister, Sarah, of Grassington, died at Skipton, 
January 28th, 1862, aged 100 years. 

Martin, Thomas, an inhabitant of Helmsley, was born 
in the year 1674, and died in November 1804, aged 130. 

Mann, Kichard, of Middleton, died in 1713, aged 
105. 

Mawhood, Mrs., widow, of Pontefract, died in 1792, 
aged 100. | 

Macknay, Barbara, of Middleton Tyas, died in 1808 ' . 
aged 102. Her whole life had been a course of unin- 
terrupted good health. 

Metcalfe, Jane, widow of Henry Metcalfe, Esq., of 



YOEKSHIEE LONGEVITY. 77 

Nappa Scar, near Askrigg, died April 3rd, 1859, in the 
lOOti year of her age.t^ 

Metcalfe, John, commonly called ^* Blind Jack, of 
Knaresborongh," died at Spofforth, about four miles from 
that town, April 26th, 1810, in the ninety-third year of his 
age. His descendants at that time were four children, 



* The Metcalfes of Wensleydale, of wliicli the house of Nappa 
was the head, were, at one time, the most numerous family in 
England. They were alike ancient and honourable; and many 
of them were highly distinguished in different capacities. 
James Metcalfe, of Nappa, was a captain in the battle of Agin- 
court. " Thomas, son of James Metcalf, as Leland tells us, 
bought Nappa, of Lord Scrope ; there was only a httle cottage on 
it, and he built the house, which, in that historian's time, was 
commony called — No Castle. He was steward receiver of the 
lands of Kichmond, and grew very rich. When Leland wi'ote, 
there were in the vicinity ' 300 men yn very knowen consanguin- 
itie to them.' In 1556, Sir Christopher Metcalfe, being high 
Sheriff of Yorkshire, met the Judges of assize, attended by 300 
horsemen, all of his own family and name, mounted on white horses, 
and clad in uniform habits. The last heir male of the senior 
line, was Thomas Metcalfe, Esq., of Nappa HaU, who died un- 
married, April 25th, 1756, aged 69." — Barker's three days in 
Wensleydale, page 222. 

The popular derivation of the name of Metcalfe is amusing. 
On a time when the country abounded with wild animals, two 
men being in the woods together, at evenfall, seeing a red four- 
footed beast coming towards them, could not imagine in the dusk 
what it was. One said, " Have you heard of lions being in these 
woods ?" The other answered he had, but had never seen any 
such thing. So they conjectured that what they saw was one. 
The creature advanced a few paces towards them. One ran 
away, the other determined to meet it. The animal happened to 
be a red calf, — so he who met it got the name of Metcalfe , and 
he who ran away, that of Lightfoot. 



1 



78 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

twenty grandchildren, and ninety great and great great 
grandchildren. He is, perhaps, one of the most remarkable 
instances on record, of the difficulties of blindness and want 
of education being overcome by perseverance and industry. 
During his long life he was engaged in the most active' 
and diverse employments. He was born at Knares- 
borough, August 15th, 1717; at the age of six years, he 
was completely deprived of sight by the small pox ; sixl 
months after his recovery, he was able to go from his fa- 
thers house to the end of the street, and return without ■ 
a guide. "When about nine years of age, he began to as- * 
sociate with other boys, rambling about with them to 
seek bird nests, and used to climb the trees for his share 
of the spoils. At the age of thirteen he was taught 
music, and soon became an able performer; he also 
learned to ride and swim, and was passionately fond of 
field sports. He began to practise, as a musician, at 
Harrogate, when twenty-five years of age, and not un- 
frequently was a guide during the darkness of night over 
the moors and wilds, then abundant in the neighbour- 
hood of Knaresborough. He was also addicted to horse 
racing, on which occasions he often rode his own horses 
He so tutored his horses, that whenever he called them 
by their respective names, they would answer by neigh- 



YORESHIEE LONGEVITY. 79 

ing, and he could readily find his own, among any num- 
ber, without any difficulty or assistance. When he 
attained the age of manhood, his mind was possessed of 
a self-dependence, rarely enjoyed by those who have the 
perfect use of all their faculties; his body was well pro- 
portioned to his mind, for, when twenty-one years of age, 
he was six feet one and a half inches in height, strong, 
and robust in proportion. Once, being desirous of ob- 
taining some fish, he, unaided, drew a net in the deepest 
part of the river Wharfe, for three hours together ; at 
one time he held the lines in his mouth, being obliged 
to swim. 

The marriage of this extraordinary individual was a 
romance in real life, something like that which Sir Walter 
Scott has described in his ballad of Lochinvar. Miss 
Benson, between whom, and our hero, a reciprocal affec- 
tion had for some time subsisted, was to be married 
next day, to one Mr. Dickinson, a husband of her pa- 
rents choice ; the damsel not relishing the match, deter- 
mined to elope with Metcalfe, blind and poor as he was ; 
they were accordingly married next day, much to the 
chagrin and disappointment of her parents and their in- 
tended son in law, and the surprise of all who knew and 
I heard of it, for she was as handsome a woman as any in 



80 YORKSHIEE LONGEVITY. 

the country. When afterwards questioned, by a lady, 
concerning this extraordinary step, and why she had re- 
fused so many good offers for ** Blind Jack ; she answer- 
ed, '* Because I could not be happy without him. " And 
being more particularly questioned, she replied — *'His 
actions are so singular, and his spirit so manly and en- 
terprising, that I could not help liking him.'* 

He continued to play at Harrogate in the season, and 
set up a four wheel chaise, and a one horse chair, for 
public accomodation ; there having been nothing of the 
kind there before. He kept these vehicles two summers, 
when the innkeepers beginning to run chaises, he gave 
them up, as he also did racing and hunting; but still, 
wanting employment, he bought horses and went to the 
coast for fish, which he took to Leeds and Manchester; 
and so indefatigable was he, that he would frequently 
walk for two nights and a day, with little or no rest; for, 
as a family was coming on, he was as eager for business 
as he had been for diversion, still keeping up his spirits, 
as Providence blessed him with good health. 

More extraordinary still, when the rebellion of 1745, 
broke out in Scotland, ** Blind Jack " joined a regiment 
of volunteers, raised by Colonel Thomas Thornton, a 
patriotic gentleman, for the defence of the house o 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 81 

Hanover, shared with them all the dangers of the cam- 
paign, defeated at Falkirk, victorious at Culloden. Jack 
^' afterwards carried on a small contraband trade, between 
the ports on the east coast and the interior ; as well as 
in galloways from Scotland, in which he met with many 
adventures. In the year 1754, he set up a stage wag- 
gon between York and Knaresborough, being the first 
on that road, and conducted it constantly himself twice 
a- week in the summer season, and once in the winter, 
which occupation he continued until he began to contract 
for making roads, which suited him better. The first 
contract of the kind which he had, was three miles be- 
f tween Minskip and Ferrensby, on the Boroughbridge 
I and Knaresborough road.^ He afterwards made hun- 
dreds of miles of road in Yorkshire, Lancashire, Cheshire, 
and Derbyshire ; he also built bridges and houses. He 
was a dealer in timber and hay, which he used to mea- 
sure, and then calculate the solid contents, by a peculiar 
method of his own. The hay he always measured with 
his arms, and, having learnt the height, he could soon 



* Dr. Hunter, in his treatise on the Harrogate Waters, has a 
little bit of dull wit on blind Jack's road making — " They em- 
ployed a blind man to lay out the roads in the neighbourhood, 
upon the ingenious principle, probably, that where such an in- 
dividual could travel, another with two eyes might surely follow." 



82 YORKSHIKE LONGEVITY. 

tell the number of square yards in any stack. When- 
ever he went out, he always carried with him a stout staff, 
some inches taller than himself, which was of great use 
to him, both in his travels and measurements. He is 
thus mentioned in a paper published in the *' Memoirs 
of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester, 
vol. 1. — His present occupation is that of a projector 
and surveyor of highways, in difficult and mountainous^ 
parts. "With the assistance only of a long staff, I havei? 
several times met this man traversing the roads, ascend- 
ing precipices, exploring valleys, and investigating their 
several extents, forms, and situations, so as to answer 
his designs in the best manner. The plans which he 
designs, and the estimates he makes, are done in a 
method peculiar to himself, and which he cannot well 
convey the meaning of to others. His abilities, in this 
respect, are, nevertheless, so great, that he finds constant 
employment. Most of the. roads over the Peak in Der- 
byshire have been altered by his directions, particularly 
those in the vicinity of Buxton ; and he is, at this time, 
constructing a new one between Wilmslow and Congleton, 
with a view to open a communication with the great 
London road, without being obliged to pass over the 
mountains." After leaving Lancashire, in 1792, he 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 88 

settled at Spofforth, and lived, with his daughter, on a 

small farm there, till his death. The following inscrip- 
' tion, copied from the headstone, erected to his memory 

in Spofforth churchyard, at the cost of Lord Dundas, 
i will be interesting, as it contains a summary of his life 

and character : — 

1 " Here Kes John Metcalf, one whose infant sight, 

Felt the dark pressure of an endless night ; 
' Yet such the fervour of his dauntless mind, 

His limhs full strung, his spirits unconlined, 
j That, long ere yet life's bolder years began, 

I The sightless efforts marked th' aspiring man ; 

Nor marked in vain — high deeds his manhood dared, 

And commerce, travel, both his ardour shared ; 

'Twas his a guide's unerring aid to lend, — 

O'er trackless wastes to bid new roads extend; 

And, when rebellion reared her giant size, 

' Twas his to bum with partriot enterprise ; 
! For parting wife and babes, a pang to feel, 

Then welcome danger for his country's weal. 
. Eeader ! Hke him exert thy utmost talent given ! 

Reader, like him adore the bounteous hand of heaven !" 

HE DIED ON THE 26tH OF APEIL, 1801, 
IN THE 93rd year OF HIS AGE. 

' MiDDLEHAM, Mrs., widow, of Holbcck, near Leeds, 
died in 1794, aged 101. 

MiLBOURNE, Mary, of Sessay, near Thirsk, died in 
November, 1784, aged 101. She was a widow and a 
pauper many years. 

Miller, Sarah, of Hardcastle, in Nidderdale, was 

buried at Pateley Bridge, October 19th, 1820, aged 108. 

g2 



84 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

She was married and had a family. For a great number 
of years she was employed as a hand metal washer — that 
is, a washer of lead ore — at the Cockhill lead mine,J 
Greenhow-hill. (About half a century ago, this worki 
was commonly done by women, with hand selves, now* 
it is done by machinery.) She followed this hard worb 
until she was upwards of one hundred years of age ; and, 
such was her thrift and economy of time, that she was 
always engaged in knitting when walking to and from; 
her work ; and even on her longer journeys, to Pateley 
Bridge, and other places, she was nearly always to be 
seen industriously plying her knitting needles. On the 
hundredth anniversary of her birthday, she made a feast 
at her house, to which she invited several of the master 
miners ; one of the principal dishes on this memorable 
occasion was a goose pie (a grand and glorious dish, 
was the standing goose pie at Christmas, in days not 
long since past). She possessed the use of her faculties, 
and her memory, which was singularly retentive nearly 
to the last. 

Montgomery, Robert, died at Skipton, in Craven, 
January 26th, 1671, aged 127. He was a native of 
Scotland ; but the oldest inhabitant of Skipton never 
knew him but as an aged man. During many years 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 85 

of the latter part of his life he obtained a livelihood by 
sohciting alms from door to door, and in the public 
places of the town, which he did till within a year of 
his death. 

Morgan, Walter, of Rotherham, died in 1813, aged 

100. He had been a soldier in early life, and seen 
much hard service. 

Morris, Martha, of Leeds, died in 1812, aged 104. 

Moore, Mrs., of York, died in 1769, aged 107. 

Morrison, James, of Harrogate, died in 1734, aged'' 
102. He was a musician at that watering place more 
than seventy years, and followed his favourite pursuit 
till his death. 

Mallinson, Mary, died at Harrogate, in 1820, aged 

101. She was buried in the ground attached to St, 
John's Chapel, where Christ's Church now stands. 

Myers, Mary, of Northwoods, near Pateley Bridge, 
died September 20th, 1743, aged 120 years. There is 
a stone to her memory in the burial ground attached to 
the old church at Pateley Bridge. 

Mawer, Mary, died at Shaw Mills, near Ripley, May, 
1861, aged 100 years. 

Myers, Ann, of Birstwith, near Ripley, died in 
1 February, 1823, aged 102 years. 



86 YORKSHIEE LONGEVITY. 

IsT 

Naylor, John, of East Ardsley, near Wakefield, died 
May 24tli, 1862, aged 99 years. He was the last lineal 
descendant of the notorious James Naylor of the same 
place, better known in his time as ** the mad Quaker of 
Ardslaw, " who suffered such cruel treatment from the 
second parliament of Cromwell, which said parliament 
did so little else, that De Foe dubs it, ^* James Naylor's 
Parliament.'* 

Newman, Thomas. In the churchyard, at Bridling- 
ton, is a tombstone, thus inscribed — *' To the memory 
of Thomas Newman, who died in 1542, aged 153. This 
stone was re-faced in 1771, to preserve the recollection 
of this remarkable prolongation of human life." Next 
to Henry Jenkins, he is the oldest Yorkshireman of 
whom we have any record. 

NoRRis, Widow, died at Leeds, in 1705, aged 
106. 

North, John, died at Holme, in 1811, aged 101. 

Northallerton. The registers of this parish, from 
1721 to 1857, inclusive, record the names of sixty-three 
persons each upwards of 90 years of age — two of them 
exceeded 100, two 99, three 98, one 97, six 96, seven 
95, four 94, five 93, six 92, nine 91, and eighteen 90. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 87 

O 

Ogden, Mary, of Holbeck, near Leeds, died in 1795, 
aged 106. 

Ogilby, Egbert, a noted old tinker, died at Leeds, 
in December, 1768, after having completed his 114th 
year. It appears from the register that he was born at 
Kipon, November 16th, 1654 ; in corroboration of which, 
his own account of himself .was, that he was put ap- 
prentice in 1668, to one Sellars, a brazier, in York, 
when he was 14 years old, served him seven years in 
that capacity, and two years more as a journeyman ; he 
then began business for himself, at Eipon, where he 
failed ; after which, he went to Hull, where he worked 
four years ; he then entered into the army of King 
James, and was sent with the regiment to which he be- 
longed, into Ireland, where, like many more, at that 
time, he changed his master, and was amongst the 
number of those who fought under King William, at the 
battle of the Boyne, in 1690, where he saw the duke of 
Schonberg fall. He served about twenty- three years 
longer in the army, in different places, and was dis- 
charged after the peace of Utrecht ; but, having neither 
wounds, infirmities, or friends to plead for him, he got 
no pension ; so he returned to his old trade, or rather 



88 YOBKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

took up the new one of travelling brazier, which he fol- 
lowed till within about four years of his death. At the i 
age of one hundred, he would carry his budget twenty 
miles in one day with as much alacrity as most men at 
fifty. Soon afterwards he grew infirm and was obliged 
to give up the itinerant trade, and take to begging. In 
appearance he was upright, tall, and thin. He is a re- 
markable instance of prolongation of life through toil, 
privation, and danger. -:< He was married to his wife 

* Many instances miglit be cited of soldiers arriving at ex- 
treme old age, the following may suffice : — 

Josliua Crewman, a pensioner of Chelsea Hospital, died in 
1794, aged 123. He served in the armies of George the first and 
second, and was discharged in the 74th year of his age. 

Williftm Billings, a soldier, died at Fairfield Head, in Stafford- 
shire, in 1793, aged 114. He was the last surviving private soldier 
in England who served under the great duke of Marlborough. 
Singular to relate, he was born under a hedge, in 1679, not a 
hundred yards from the cottage where he died. 

WiUiam Gillispie, an old Chelsea Pensioner, died at RuthweU, 
near Dumfries, Scotland, June 15th, 1818, aged 108. 

Andrew Gammels, a dragoon, in the British Service, during 
Queen Anne's wars, died at Roxburgh, in March, 1794, aged 105. 
He begged his bread for the last fifty years of his life. 

Samuel Mogg, one of the las£ survivors of the army which 
fought under General Wolfe, died in 1812, aged 102. 

James Hatfield, died in 1770, aged 105. He was the soldier, 
who, whilst on duty one night at Windsor, counted St. Paul's 
clock at midnight strike thirteen, instead of twelve ; he was 
found asleep on duty, after the hour when he ought to have been 
relieved ; was tried by a court martial, but pleaded that he was 
awake, and on duty, during his proper guard time, by saying he 
heard the clock strike thirteen, which fact, being confirmed by 
the city watchman, he was acquitted. 

William Marshall, a travelling tinker, of Kirkcudbright, died in 
1792, aged 120. He followed his occupation up to the year 
before he died. 



YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 89 

•seventy-three years, by whom he had twenty-five child- 
ren, twelve boys, and thirteen girls. His wife lived to 
the age of 106. 

OwTHORPE, Mary, died at Hessay, in 1809, aged 106. 
IP 

Paycock, James, of Nunnington, died February 10th, 
1610, aged 100. 

Pavorth, William, of Hutton, near York, died in 
December, 1776, aged 99. 

Philips, John, of Thorner, died in 1742, aged 117. 
He lived under eight crowned heads, beside the protec- 
torate of Cromwell. His teeth were good, and his 
hearing and sight, comparatively, but little impaired, 
and he was able to walk, till within a few days of his 
death. When he was about twenty-eight years of age, 
being the constable of his parish, he committed two of 
Cromwell's soldiers to the town's stocks, for some ir- 
regularities of conduct, of which they had been publicly 
guilty. t^ On complaint being made to the general, of 
this audacious behaviour on the part of the parish offi- 
cial, he dismissed the complaint at once, with a commen- 



* The constable, by common law, may confine offenders in the 
stocks, by way of security, but not by way of Punishment. — 
Burn's Justice. 



90 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

dation of the constable, and a wish expressed that all 
his men possessed the courage and moral virtue of this 
humble rustic. 

Preston, Martha, widow, of Barnsley, died in 1769, 
aged 125. She outlived five husbands, by whom she 
had twenty- seven children. 

Procter, John, of Leathley, near Otley, died in 
1710, aged 104. 

Prest, William, of Galphay, near Eipon, died in 
April, 1789, in his 109th year. He was a labourer, 
employed on the Studley Park estate, till within ten 
years of his death. He left a widow, and eight children ; 
the eldest, 88, and the youngest, 16 years of age. 

Potter. There were living, near Pontefract, in May, 
1765, a labourer, named Potter, and his wife, whose 
ages, together, made 213 ; the man, 108, and the wo- 
man, 105. 

Penrose, Thomas, of Knaresborough, died February 
7th, 1855, aged 98. He was father of thirteen child- 
ren, of whom, seven arrived at maturity. He lived to see 
three generations of his descendants. 

Pearson, Mary, of Ery holme, a poor widow, died in 
1802, aged 109. 

Pearson, Matthew, of Pannal Ash, near Harrogate, 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 91 

died in 1848, aged 112. He was a working man du- 
ring the whole of his life, and was for a long time a 
common carrier, between Leeds, Harrogate, and Knares- 
borough, and their respective neighbourhoods. He was 
only once confined to his room, by sickness, in his life, 
and that was about forty years before his death, when 
he was so dangerously ill, that the doctor gave him up 
as incurable, and told him to prepare for the worst : he 
had, however, a different opinion himself, and on the re- 
turn of his wife, to his bedside, he asked her for a glass 
of rum ; she complied with his request, thinking if it 
did no good, it could not do much harm to a dying man. 
He had no sooner swallowed it, than he said, ** Now I 
shall mend." And what will ye say to the fact, ye ad- 
vocates of the curative powers of cold water ? he did 
mend, and never had another days sickness till the close 
of his long life. He had the use of his faculties (unim- 
paired by time and severe usage) to the last, and was able 
to walk about till within a few days of his death ; which 
seemed to come to him without pain, and he died be- 
cause the lamp of life was completely burnt out. He 
was of middle stature, strong and active in his younger 
years ; and although once restored to health by a dose 
of rum, he was not a man of intemperate habits. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 



PivETT, Christopher, of the City of York, died in 
1796, aged 93. He was a carver and gilder by trade ; 
but during the early part of his life served in the 
army ; he was present at the battles of Fontenoy, and 
Dettingen, as well as the siege of Carlisle, and the battle 
of CuUoden, in the Scottish rebellion. After he settled 
at York, his house was accidently burnt down ; when he 
formed the singular resolution, of never again sleeping 
on a bed, lest he should be burnt to death whilst asleep, 
or not have sufficient time to remove his property, should 
an accident occur again ; and this resolution he strictly 
kept during the remaining forty years of his life. His 
practice was to repose upon the floor, or on two chairs, 
or, sitting in a chair, but always with his clothes on. 
During the whole of this period he lived entirely alone, 
cooked his own victuals, and seldom admitted any one 
into his habitation : nor would he disclose to any, the 
place of his birth, or to whom he was related. He had 
many singularities, but possessed, politically, as well as 
socially, a laudable spirit of independence, which he 
boldly manifested on several trying occasions. Among 
other uncommon articles, which composed the furniture 
of his dwelling, was a human scull, which he strictly 
ordered should be buried with him. 



YORKSHIEE LONGEVITY. 93 

Patefield, Elias, of Northowram, died in 1754, 
aged 100 ; and his wife aged 99, died nearly at the 
same time. They had been married sixty years. 

He, first departed — she, for one hour, tried 
To live without him, liked it not, and died. 

Paul, Ann, widow, of Skipton, died in 1825, aged 100. 

Paudames, Samuel, of Teddington, near Malton, 
died in 1798, aged 105. 

Peakson, Maey, a maiden lady, of ShelEeld, died in 
1837, aged 97. 

Pickles, Joseph, of Wilsden, died May 14th, 1828, 
in the 96th year of his age. He left a surviving pro- 
geny of seven children, seventy-three grand children, 
one hundred and seventy-nine great grand children, and 
fifty great great grand children, in all three hundred and 
nine, exclusive of one hundred and one deceased. 

Pakker, Ann, of Skelding, near Eipon, died Novem- 
ber 30th, 1863, aged 102. 

Randall, Eve, of Leeds, died September 29th, 1830, 
aged 100. 

Reynolds, Ann, of Tunstall, near Catterick, died in 
1808, aged 103. 

Rheam, Mrs., widow, of Copmanthorpe, near York, 
died in 1791, aged 101. 



94 YOEKSHIKE LONGEVITY. 

KicHAEDsoN, EsTHEB, of Langton-on-the-Wolds, near 
Malton, died in 1786, aged 109. 

Egberts, John, of Hipperholme, in the parish of 
Halifax, died November 10th, 1721, aged 114. 

RoDGERS, Aaron, of Sheffield, died in 1795, aged 101. 

RoBSHAw, SusHANNAH, of East-MooT, near Leeds, 
died in 1807, aged 103. 

RoLLiNSON, Thomas, died at Halton, near Leeds, May 
16th, 1831. He was 100 years of age, the 27th of Jan- 
uary, previous to his death. "With the exception of the 
loss of his eyesight, a short time previous to his decease, he 
enjoyed uninterrupted good health. He had a perfect 
recollection of visiting the encampment on Clifford Moor, 
in 1745 ; and many other events of that period, were fre- 
quent subjects of his aged narration. He lived to see 
four generations of his own descendants, who all attended 
him to the grave. Though humble in life, he adorned 
his station by integrity, sobriety, and industry. He 
was married sixty-nine and a-half years ; and was never 
known to sing, whistle, or swear, and was never, but 
once, intoxicated with liquor during his long life. 

Russell, Mary, widow, of Upper Hallam, near 
Sheffield, died in 1837, aged 96. She left nearly ono 
hundred descendants living. 



YORKSHIBB LONGEVITY. 95 

Rymer, Baetholemew, of Ripon, died in 1791, aged 
100. He was a man of great activity, and uniformly 
enjoyed good health. He was gamekeeper to Sir Bel- 
lingham Graham, Bart., of Norton Conyers, and shot 
game flying in his 99th year. 

RusHwoRTH, Ann, of Birstwith, near Ripley, died in 
January, 1829, aged 101 years. 

Ratcliffe. October 25th, 1503, William Ratclifie, 
100 years of age; Nicholas Whitfield, of 98; and John 
Thorn, of 80 years of age ; gave evidence, *' for verrey 
trawthe," of the affiance or marriage of Elizabeth 
Clifford and Robert Plumpton, in the *'chapell within 
the castell of Skypton." 

s 

Sagae, James, died at Leeds, in 1701, aged 112. 

ScARR, John, of Hawes, in Wensleydale, died in April, 
1788, aged 105. He could thread a needle without 
spectacles, and crack nuts with his teeth, i^ the last 
year of his life, as well as most young people. 
. Sedgfield, Henry, mariner, of Scarborough, died at 
Edinburgh, in 1787, aged 107. 

Shepherd, John, of Tadcaster, died in 1757, aged 
109. 



I 



yt) YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

Sharp, Stephen, of Bramhope, near Leeds, died in 
1805, aged 107. 

Shepherd, John, of Soyland, near Halifax, died in 
1830, aged 100. 

Sherwood, Mr., of Stokesley, died in 1794, aged 105. j 
He practised much temperance, in all his modes of living, f 
and accustomed himself to constant exercise in the open 
air. 

Sharp, Elizabeth, of the parish of Brompton-on- 
Swale, completed her hundredth year in August, 1858. 
She is now chargeable to the parish for her maintenance ; 
has the full use of all her faculties little impaired by 
time, and during her life has invariably enjoyed good 
health. 

Simpson, John, of Knaresborough, died in April, 
1766, aged 112. He could read print without spectacles, 
and never had any illness till within three months of 
his death. 

Simpson, Joshua, Esq., of Hunslet, near Leeds, died 
in 1780, aged 104. 

Simpson, Mrs., died at Leeds, in 1698, aged 103. 

Simmons, Edward, of Leeds, died in 1840, aged 104. 
He served twenty-two years in the 25th regiment of 



YOKKSHIKE LONGEVITY. 97 

foot, and was an out- door pensioner of Chelsea, since 
1792. 

SowDEN, John, of Brighouse, near Halifax, died 
March 21st, 1829, in the 92nd year of his age. He 
j was born in the house where he died, and never lived 
one month in any other. He brought up to maturity in 
I the same house, ten children, six of whom were living 
at the time of his death. He had forty-five grand- 
children, and fifty-three great grandchildren; twenty- 
three of whom were married. 

SoMERSGiLL, CATHERINE, of Chapcl Allerton, near 
Leeds, died in 1794, aged 100. 

Speed, Mary, of Worsall, near Yarm, died in 1781, 

aged 103. This poor, but industrious woman, was 

early left a widow, with several children to support, 

almost entirely by her own labour. Finding ordinary 

female employments insufficient to procure a mainten- 

j ance for herself and family, she engaged herself as a 

' bricklayer's assistant, or in the performance of any 

, other heavy drudgery, by which she might be enabled 

to earn more : which practice she continued till all her 

children were so far grown up as to be able to provide 

for themselves. She afterwards employed herself in 

spinning, which occupation she followed till the time of 



»8 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 



her death, which took place without any previous in- 
disposition. 

She passed at once from life to death, 
And ceased at once to work and live. 

Spencer, Eichard, of Scarborough, died in 1785, | 
aged 100. '- 

Smith, Thomas, of Knaresborough, was buried March 
11th, 1850, just one hundred years after the day he 
was born. He was a linen manufacturer in his youth, 
and, later in life, keeper of St. Robert's Chapel. In 
personal appearance he was tall and thin. He left 
eighteen children by his wife, only five of whom were 
married at the time of his death. He had, nevertheless, 
thirty-five grandchildren, fifty great grandchildren, and 
two great great grandchildren. He had a perfect re- 
collection of seeing the body of Eugene Aram on the 
gibbet at Thistle Hill, when he was nine or ten years 
old ; and, as Aram was hung upon *Hhat tree of shame,'* 
in August, 1759, he would be about that age at that 
time. 

The same family, and the same place, is remarkable 
for having produced other two persons who each lived 
more t han a century : the father and grandfather of | 
Thomas Smith, The father died in 1798, aged 103 ; 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 99 

while the grandfather attained the age of 108. The 
three were born, lived, and died in the same house, — 
a small cottage, situated close to the cliffs, near to St. 
Robert's Chapel and the river Nidd. It belongs to the 
family of Slingsby, of Scriven, and was occupied by the 
family of Smith more than three hundred years. They 
entirely made the garden in front of the Chapel, by 
placing soil, brought from a distance, upon the bare 
rock. When the grandfather occupied the place the 
rent was one shilling per annum ; when the late Sir 
Thomas Slingsby came into possession it was raised to 
five shillings ; when the present Baronet became owner 
it was advanced to forty-nine shillings. After the death 
of their father, the two unmarried daughters were not 
allowed to occupy it any longer, and the humble cot, 
which had produced so many specimens of longevity, 
passed into another family. 

Smith, Sarah. The Annual Register, for the year 

1760, contains the following instance of longevity :— 

1 " There is now living one brother and four sisters, born 

j in the parish of Hemingbrough, in the County of York, 

I who reside in that and the adjacent parishes, whose 

I ages put together amount to four hundred and sixty-five 

years, all hearty and well. The mother of the above 

L.ofC. h2 



100 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

persons, whose name was Sarah Smith, died but a few 
years ago, agerd 103 years : she never knew a day's 
sickness, and retained her senses to the last, — the 
happy effects of a life of innocence and temperance." 

Steel, John, of Bishop Thornton, near Eipon, died 
in 1833, aged 100. He retained his faculties in vigour 
to the last, and distinctly remembered, when a boy, 
going to see the King's troops encamped on Kirby Hill 
Moor, during the rebellion of 1745 ; also many other 
events of the early part of the reign of George II. 

Storey, Neriah, of Leeds, died in 1764, aged 100. 

Stephenson, George, of Komaldkirk, died in July, 
1855, aged 105. He had passed most of his life as an 
agricultural labourer, and had been invariably an early 
riser, even till within a few months of his death. During 
the latter part of his life, he resided with his daughter 
at Eomaldkirk, to which place he walked from Darling- 
ton, in one day, a distance of twenty-two miles, when 
in his hundredth year. He used frequently to reprove 
his daughter and her husband, both upwards of 70 years 
of age, for indulging in bed so long in the mornings, 
—-though they generally rose before six, — telling them, 
if they would not work when young, vrhat would they 
do when old. He possessed his mental faculties to the 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 101 

last, and, having a most retentive memory, one of his 
greatest pleasures was to recount the events of his 
youthful days. 

Stringer, Ann, of Northallerton, died in September, 
1721, aged 108. 

Stirk, Clara, widow, of Skipton, died in 1812, 
aged 100. 

Sturton, William, of Patrington, in Holderness, 
was buried May 18th, 1685, aged 97. He had child- 
ren — by his first wife, twenty-eight ; by his second 
wife, seventeen — being own father to forty-five, grand- 
father to eighty-six, great grandfather to ninety-seven, 
and great great grandfather to twenty-three, — in all two 
hundred and fifty-one. The above particulars are en- 
graven on his tombstone in the churchyard of Hedon, 
near Hull. 

Sturdy, William, of Eomanby, near Northallerton, 
died in March, 1835, aged 100. 

Stott, James, farmer, of Brompton- on- Swale, near 
Eichmond, died September 11th, 1851, aged 104. He 
had full possession of all his faculties up to the time of 
his decease. He was a slight made man, about four 
feet four inches in height ; was born in that parish, and 
never lived out of it. 



102 YORKSHIKE LONGEVITY. 

Storzaker, John, of Hutton Oonyers, near Kipon, 
died in 1704, aged 100. 

SuTCLiFFE, John, a farmer in the township of Bier- 
cliffe, near Colne, in the ninety-third year of his age, 
attended, on the 18th of October, 1838, the rent-day 
of Mr. Foulds, after walking three miles and a half, to , 
to pay his rent the one hundred and sixtieth time, hav- 
ing come regularly twice a-year, for the previous eighty 
years, without a single interruption. This family has 
resided on the estate for upwards of two centuries, 
during which time they have always — at the season — 
brought a live goose as a boon, and the present Mr. 
Sutcliflfe says that he has heard his grandfather assert 
that, in the earlier part of his time when they had oc- 
casion to buy it, the price paid for the goose was four- 
pence. 

Sykes, John, of Snowgatehead, in Fulstone, parish 

of Kirkburton, near Huddersfield, died in 1800, aged 

101 years. 

T 

Tate, Mrs., widow, of Malton, died in 1772, aged 
106. 

Tarran, Christopher, of Sutton, near Richmond, 
died in 1827, aged 93. He was a man of very eccen- 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 103 

trie habits, and much given to seclution, which he at 
length carried so far, as to shut himself up entirely from 
the world, and live alone in his chamber, from which he 
never stirred during the last twenty years of his life, nor 
ever, but on two occasions, admitted any one within its 
precints. 

Taylor, Mary, died February 4th, 1860, in the Union 
Workhouse, Doncaster, aged 103. 

Thompson, Joseph, farmer, of Walmgate bar, York, 
died in 1781, aged 103. He left a son nearly eighty 
years of age. 

Thompson, Francis, of Binsoe, near Bedale, died in 
1746, aged 112. He was buried in the church yard of 
West Tanfield, where a tombstone records the above 
facts. 

Thompson, Joseph, of Lyth, near Whitby, died in 
1817, aged 102. 

Thornton, James, of Pudsey, died in 1699, aged 104. 

Todd, Mary, of Eichmond, died in September, 1790, 
aged 105. Her life was an almost uninterrupted course 
of good health, and her sight was so perfect to the end 
of her days that she had no need of spectacles. 

Trueman, Isaac, of Kettlewell, near Skipton, died in 
1770, aged 117. Till within a year of his death he had 



104 YOEKSHIEE LONGEVITY. 

the enjoyment of his sight, and all other faculties, in as 
great perfection as he had at thirty. He had served in 
the army, was sergeant in the first year of Queen Ann, 
and was engaged in many battles and sieges, during her 
reign, upon the continent. After leaving the regiment, 
nearly the whole of his time was devoted to fishing. 

TuKNER, Mrs., of Everthorpe, near Cave, died in 
1806, aged 104. 

Watkinson, Phcebe, of Gleadless, near Sheffield, 
died in 1819, aged 107. 

Wainwright, George, of Dore, near Sheffield, died 
in 1821, aged 107. 

Wainwright, John, of Cherry Tree Hill, Sheffield, 
died in 1809, aged 96. 

Wade, Thomas, of Addingham, died in 1810, aged 
101. 

Walkington, William, of Kirkby Misperton, near 
Malton, died 1820, aged 111. 

Westmorland, William, Esq., of Harrogate, died in 
1798, aged 99. He enjoyed such an uninterrupted 
state of good health as to attend constantly at the 
'* Spa " till within a fortnight of his decease. 

Wells, Henry, of Whitby, died in 1794, aged 109. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 105 

His health was uniformly sound and good till a short 
time before his death. He was, however, almost blind, 
and was led through the streets by a poor woman, carry- 
ing on his shoulders a few mats, for sale, of his own 
manufacture. 

Webster, Mary, widow, of Hull, died in 1816, aged 
104. 

Whitehead, Joshua, of Addlecroft, near Huddersfield, 
died in 1828, aged 105. 

Whitehead, John, of Clectheaton, died in 1814, 
aged 97. He left one hundred and ninety-nine descend- 
ants. 

Wheatley, Mr., clothier, of Leeds, died in 1780, 
aged 106. 

Wharton, George, of Laverton, near Eipon, died 
January 23rd, 1844, aged 112. He enjoyed an almost 
uninterrupted flow of health and spirits till within a few 
weeks of his death ; was of a cheerful, lively, disposi- 
tion, and enjoyed a jest and temperate glass as much as 
any man. In personal appearance he was particularly 
neat and clean, his dress in the fashion which prevailed 
about fifty years before his death. He always wore 
very large buckles on his shoes ; was low in stature, 
slender, smart, erect, and nearly always in^motion during 



106 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

the day; retired to rest early, and rose early in the 
morning. His sight was so perfect that he could read 
the smallest type of a newspaper, without spectacles, 
till within a year of his death. He was born in London, 
and could remember the news arriving in England, of 
the capture of Quebec, and the death of General Wolfe 
in 1759 — was full of anecdote of the Middlesex elections, 
and ^* Jack "Wilkes," whom he used to describe as ** an 
ugly squinting fellow." In his early manhood he was 
impressed and served aboard a man of war in the East 
Indian seas, and elsewhere. 

Whitehead, Levi, of Bramham, died in December, 
1787, in the 100th year of his age. He was noted for 
swiftness in running ; having won the buck's head for 
several years, at Castle Howard. He also won the five 
Queen Ann's guineas, given by William Aislabie, of 
Studley, near Eipon; beating the then noted Indian, 
and nine others, selected to *start against him. In his 
twenty- second year, he ran four miles over Bramham 
moor, in nineteen minutes ; and, what is more remark- 
able, in his ninety-fifth and ninety-sixth years he fi:e- 
quently walked from Bramham to Tadcaster, a distance 
of four miles, in an hour. He retained his faculties to 
the last. 



TORKSHIKE LONGEVITY. 107 

White, Sarah, of Bramley, near Leeds, died in No- 
vember, 1760, aged 106. 

Wharton, Mrs. Margaret, died at Thirsk, in 1791, 
aged 103. Slie was of the family of the Whartons of 
Skelton Castle, in Cleveland ; was never married, im- 
mensely rich, and extremely eccentric, setting the con- 
ventional usages of high life at defiance, or treating 
them as frivolous. In person she was short, and rather 
stoutly built. She was possessed of a fortune of twa 
hundred thousand pounds ; of which, with rare liberality, 
she made her nephew a present of one hundred thousand 
pounds. Her charities were liberal, but always private: 
nothing hurt her so much as to have them divulged. 
She withdrew her benevolence from those who spoke of 
receiving her gifts. It gave her great pleasure to know 
that she was deemed rich. 

For some time she resided at York, and visited Scar- 
borough in the season; where, from her frequently 
sending for a pennyworth of Strawberries, and a penny- 
worth of cream, she obtained the name of " Peg Penny- 
worth," which never forsook her. An incident occurred 
in which she displayed her aversion to public charity — ^ 
some gentlemen soliciting her charity, whom she could 
scarcely deny, about the year 1774, when light guineas 



108 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

were in disgrace, she pulled a number out of her purse, 
and, turning them over, selected one of the lightest ; this^ 
produced a few winks and smiles: but the matter was 
not to rest here ; the celebrated Foote laid hold of the 
incident, and drew her character in a farce, under the 
name of *^Peg Pennyworth." When informed of this 
circumstance, she exclaimed, with a smile — **I will see 
it acted, as I live." She did, and declared with joy, 
that they had done her justice. 

She frequently chose to be her own caterer, making her 
own purchases, and taking them home in her carriage. 
Once, having purchased some eels, she put them in her 
pocket, entered her coach, and called upon a lady, ta 
take her an airing. The warmth of her body soon 
revived the seemingly dead eels, and one of them 
crept out to enjoy a little fresh air. The lady friend saw 
it, and screamed out in horror, — '* Madam ! you have an 
adder creeping about you ! Coachman, stop ! let me out ! 
let me out!" To this tragic exclamation Margaret 
coolly replied, — ** you need not be frightened, madam, 
I protest one of my eels is alive." In one of her visits 
to Scarborough, she, with her usual economy, had a 
family pie made for dinner ; she directed the footman 
to take it to the bakehouse, who rather declined, as not 



YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 109 

being his place, or his dignity might suffer a Uttle in 
consequence of performing so ungentlemanly an action — 
she next moved the question to the coachman, but found 
a stronger objection still — so, to save the dignity of 
both, she resolved to take the pie herself; and ordered 
one to harness and bring out the carriage, the other to 
mount behind ; and, entering the coach herself, took the 
pie, thus honourably dignified, to the bakehouse. When 
baked, coachee was ordered to put to his horses a se- 
cond time, and the footman again to mount, and the pie 
was brought back in the same honourable state in which 
it went. ^*Now," says she to the coachman, "you 
have kept your place, which is to drive" — ** and yours," 
to the footman, '* which is to wait." 

A clergyman's wife having kept up a visiting connex- 
ion in York, the clergyman dying, and leaving the lady 
in affluence, she retired to Thirsk, with four daughters, 
and sdicited Mrs. Wharton to pay her a visit. She 
consented, took her carriage and servants. After some 
time, the lady began to think the visit rather protracted, 
particularly as she had a family of her own to provide 
for ; but Mrs. Wharton thought that treating the young 
ladies with a frequent airing in her carriage was an am- 
ple recompense. A growing discontent cannot be 



110 TORKSHIBE LONGEVITY. 

smothered. The lady could neither find a remedy nor 
complain. At length she ventured to hint to Mr. Whar- 
ton — **that the pressure was great.'* '*Be silent, 
madam," said he ; ** let my aunt have her way, I will pay 
you two hundred a year during the life of my aunt, and 
one hundred during your own, should you survive her." 

Mrs. "Wharton ended her days with this lady, and the 
hundred a year was regularly paid to the day of her 
death. 

Wilkinson, Mary, of Eomaldkirk, died in 1783, aged 
109. 

Wilson, William, of Whitkirk, near Leeds, died in 
1830, aged 101. 

Wilkinson, Francis, of Bishopton, near Eipon, died 
in 1830, aged 105. 

WiGGiN, Thomas, of Carlton, in Craven, died in 1670, 
aged 108. He enjoyed a remarkable good state of health, 
and was able to walk about till within a few days of his 
death. 

WiLKiNS, Major, died in 1756, aged 100. He was 
imprisoned for debt in York Castle, during the long 
period of fifty years. 

Wilson, William, of East Eow, near Whitby, died 
in 1795, aged 100. 



YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. Ill 

Wilson, Nathaniel, of Cottingham, near Hull, died 
in 1804, aged 96. His faculties were so sound, and 
his general health so good, as to enable him to maintain 
himself by the labour of his hands, till within about two 
years of his death. He buried his wife when he was 
about sixty-two years of age ; after which, for the long 
space of thirty-two years, he lived in the same cottage 
alone. He was very abstemious in his diet, living chiefly 
on bread, cheese, and milk. 

Wilson, Thomas, of Minskip, near Boroughbridge, 
died in March, 1859, aged 96. He was able to walk 
about till within a few days of his death ; of a kind, easy, 
cheerful, disposition, and a remarkably early riser. 

Williamson, Elizabeth, of Scarborough, died in 
1856, aged 102. 

WiDDOP, Adam, of Keighley, died in 1656, aged 100, 

Wilkinson, Elizabeth, of Butterworth's yard. Kirk- 
gate, Leeds, died January 8th, 1833, aged 93. 

Woodward, Frances, of Carlton, in Craven, died in 
1662, aged 102. 

Wood, Susannah, of Newton-upon-Ouse, near York 
died in 1780, aged 104. 

Woodhouse, Mr., of Hallam, near Sheffield, died in 
1821, aged 95. He left one hundred and fifty-five 



112 YOEKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

descendants. The faculties of his mind continued sound 
and clear to the end of his days, and he frequently adverted 
to the circumstance of being employed, when a young 
man, to convey straw for the use of the troops encamped 
on Doncaster moor, during the rebellion of 1745. 

Wood, Nathan, of Soyland, near Halifax, died 
December, 25th, 1704, aged 108. 

Wright, Mrs. Mary, a highly esteemed minister of 
the Society of Friends, died in Camp Lane Court, 
Leeds, March 14th, 1858, in her 104th year. 

Wright, Henry, of Keighley, died in 1598, aged 100. 

Walker, Old Molly, a character well-known in 
Craven, died at the *^Club Houses," Skipton, January 
21st, 1862, aged 103 years. 



A.3Dr)Ei>rDA.. 



BboTH, Ellen, of Scholes, Kirkburton, was bnried 
in July, 1708, aged 100. 

Olaycon, Elizabeth, widoipf , Kirkburton, was buried 
Febuary 20th, 1655, in the ll*8th year of her age. 

Ellis, Robert, of Burnside, Hepworth, was buried 
December 25th, 1749, aged 106 years. 

Green, Elizabeth, of Holme, in the parish of 
Almondbury, was buried April 8th, 1596, ag^d 100 
years. 

Grime, Nicholas, of Brockholes, Almondbury, was 
buried March 9th, 1695, aged 96 years. 

Kay, Dinah, of Castle Hill, Almondbury, widow, was 
buried March 10th, 1695, aged 105 years. 

Earnshaw, Maria, of Honley, widow, was buried 
March 10th, 1695, aged 90 years ; and 

Dyson, Alice, widow of Daniel Dyson, of Crossland, 
was buried March 10th, 1695, aged 63 years. 

The above four individuals, — whose united ages 
amounted to three hundred and fifty-four years, — ^were 



114 YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY. 

all buried at the Parish Church of Almondbury, within 
the space of forty-eight hours ; affording another proof 
that there are times more than ordinarily fatal to the 
aged. 

HiNCHLiFFE, James, of Millshaw, in Hepworth, 
clothier, was buried in May, 1812, aged 102 years. 

Lee, — , widow, of Broom Bank Steele, was buried 
March 2nd, 1670, aged 105 years. 



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Just Published crown, 8vo., paper boards, 2s. 6d., cloth, lettered, 
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NIDDERDALE: 

OR, 

AN HISTORICAL, TOPOGRAPHICAL, AND DESCRIPTIVE 

SKETCH OF THE VALLEY OF THE NIDD. 

BY WILLIAM GEAINGE. 

** The opening out of the beautiful and highly romantic valley 
of the Nidd by the Harrogate and Pateley Bridge Railway, ren- 
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varied kind, has been a comparatively unexplored region. . . 
The book before us is exactly what the district required to make 
its attractions known to the world ; and it is, also, just the book 
we would place in the hands of the tourist settkig out to explore 
the wonders of Nidderdale." — Harrogate Herald, 

Now Ready, Foolscap octavo, cloth, 

YORKSHIRE LONGEVITY: 

OR, 

RECORDS AND BIOGRAPHICAL ANECDOTES OF PERSONS 

WHO HAVE ATTAINED TO EXTREME OLD AGE WITHIN 

THAT COUNTY, 

BY WILLIAM GRAINGE. 

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LONDON: T. T. LEMARE, PATERNOSTER ROW; 

AND THROUGH ANY BOOKSELLER. 



WORKS PUBLISHED BY THOMAS THORPE. — CONTINUED. 
Also Ready, crown 8vo., in a neat cover, 

A GUIDE TO BRIMHAM ROCKS: 

Descriptive and Historical. 

BY WILLIAM GRAINGE. 

In preparation, and shortly will be published, crown 8vo., in a 
neat wrapper, 

A Guide to Stump Cross Caverns, 

Trowler's Gill, Ravensgill, 

and Guy's-Cliffe, 

WITH 

A LIST OF FERNS & MOSSES. 

BY WILLIAM GRAINGE. 

Price One Penny, 

AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTRY: 

A LECTURE. 

BY G. GEJEY WATSON, F.H.S. 

Published Annually, price One Penny, 

THE NIDDERDALE ALMANACK, 

AND YEAR BOOK OF USEFUL INFORMATION. 

PATELEY BRIDGE: 

THOMAS THORPE, PRINTER AND PUBLISHER. 

LONDON : T. T. LEMARE, PATERNOSTER ROW ; 

AND THROUGH ANY BOOKSELLER. 






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